KSS Monday

How quickly time flies when we're having fun. Today is the last day of January and today will be my last post as KSS Guest Designer. It certainly has been a fun month starting with the grand opening of the forum and gallery.
I created my card using several of the weekly challenges as my focus. I will start by saying that this was NOT a 10 minute or less card, as I am somewhat circle-challenged. I started with Connie's Friday sketch challenge. I used Lisa's Stock up on Occasions theme of St. Patrick's Day (added a few Good Luck items). As for Makiko's Make It Glamorous with Glitter challenge, I used a bit of bling instead of glitter. Does that count? Julie's Word of the Week is "Live". I figured that with a green beer, we could live it up in celebration of St. Patrick's Day.
Now to my card. It is an actual circle card. I used stamps from Multi-Step Cup of Warm Comfort, Multi-Step Shamrocks and Clover, Multi-Step Lucky Horseshoe, and Ready 4 any Holiday. The background layer is stamped all over with the large and the small shamrock. The square sentiment layer is stamped in Bottle. The narrow rectangle layer has rows of green rhinestone at each end. On the circle, image layer I stamped the green beer and masked it so I could stamp the two horseshoes. Notice that they are open at the top so they can catch the good luck and not spill it. The horseshoes have tiny beads attached for the nails. The beer has a fluffy foam mady with a Diva ice white pearl pen. It almost looks good enough to drink.

Thanks so much for stopping by. I hope you will visit the other Design Team Members to see what wonderful creations they have made.

Angela • Connie • Julie • Lisa • Lynn • Makiko • Maria

Color Recipes: (All inks used are Adirondack)
Shamrocks - 1 willow, 2 clover, 3 bottle
Green beer - 1 willow, 2 juniper, 3 lemonade, 4 citrus
Horseshoes - 1 lake mist, 2 slate, 3 jet black 



KSS Monday

This week my KSS Monday card is a combination of my new Multi Step Invisible Snowman set of stamps, the Friday sketch challenge from Connie and the Tuesday Pantry challenge (embossing folders) from Makiko. I took the liberty of turning the sketch on its side so I could add the sentiment. Have you visited the KSS forum lately? There are daily challenges from the Crew members and lots of valuable information. Visit the gallery there for inspiration and ideas.

Thanks so much for stopping by. I hope you will visit the other Design Team Members to see what wonderful creations they have made.

Angela • Connie • Julie • Lisa • Lynn • Makiko • Maria

Color recipes: (All inks are Adirondack unless noted)
Hat -- 1 lake mist, 2 slate, 3 smokey grey (Versafine), 4 Jet Black
Scarf -- 1 watermelon, 2 cranberry
Pipe -- 1 latte, 2 caramel, 3 espresso
Eyes and Mouth -- 1 slate, 2 jet black
Carrot -- 1 peach bellini, 2 sunset orange, 3 rust
Buttons -- 1 sail boat blue, 2 denim

Valentine Design

This week the Blogger's Challenge is theme pattern papers. I chose to use paper from Tim Holtz's Vintage Shabby paper stack to create a Valentine Card. Valentine, by the way, is also the challenge at Tuesday Throwdown. I love this particular paper stack because of the cool colors. The background panel is done with one striped pattern. The rosette is done with more of a scroll pattern. The heart in the center and the little heart are from Kitchen Sink Stamps. The rickrack across the bottom actually turned out to be too pink, so I went over it with Victorian Velvet distress ink to tone it down. The panel is also edged with Victorian Velvet. Burgundy Stickles was used to edge the rosette and heart. The flourish is made with pearls and rhinestones. It adds a pretty bling to the whole card.
Color recipe for KSS stamps: (all ink used is Adirondack)
Rose Heart -- 1 pink sherbert, 2 raspberry, 3 wild plum, 4 cranberry
Small heart -- 1 pink sherbert, 2 wild plum, archival black for sentiment 

I'm excited to announce that I have just been selected to be on the Design Team for Class Act Stamps -- the Chapel Road Division. Look for artwork starting around the end of February.

KSS Monday

Hi and Happy KSS Monday. I can't believe how fast January is going by. This is my third week as Guest Designer for Kitchen Sink Stamps and I am having so much fun working (really playing, it's too much fun to call it work) with the stamps. Today I am featuring stamps from the new release Multi Step Bunch O' Balloons and Multi Step Li'l Elephant. As soon as I saw the balloons , I knew I wanted to put them together with the adorable elephant. My layout is based Connie's Friday Carte Challenge. You can find the different crew challenges at the Kitchen Sink Stamp Forum.

Thanks so much for stopping by. I hope you will visit the other Design Team Members to see what wonderful creations they have made.

Angela • Connie • Julie • Lisa • Lynn • Makiko • Maria

Color recipes: (All inks used are Adirondack)

1st balloon -- 1 cloudy blue, 2 sailboat blue, 3 stonewashed, 4 denim

2nd Balloon -- 1 shell pink, 2 cool peri, 3 purple twilight, 4 eggplant

Elephant -- 1 lake mist, 2 pebble, 3 slate, 4 archival black

KSS Monday

It's time for another Kitchen Sink Monday! This week I decided to share a Valentine's card with you. Yes, Valentines Day is only a little over a month away. I used the new release, Multi Step Sweet Heart Roses. I think that this heart is so beautiful.

My card is a CAS card (clean and simple). I think the heart image speaks for itself. I first made the frame from light pink cardstock using a Cuttlebug folder. I cut out the center oval. The hearts were stamped on a white panel to fit beneath the frame. I stamped the first heart and then masked it. I then stamped the second heart. For a sentiment I stamped the xoxo (kisses and hugs). I highlighted the frame with spun sugar distress stickles. This gives the frame a pretty sparkle. The panels were attached to a deeper pink base card.
Thanks so much for stopping by. I hope you will visit the other Design Team Members to see what delightful creations they have made.

Angela • Connie • Julie • Lisa • Lynn • Makiko • Maria

Simon Says Stamp and Show Your Newest Stamp

This week Simon Says Stamp and Show your newest stamp. I needed this challenge. I got kind of far behind in using my newest stamps. My card is created using two of my newest stamps. The sentiment is from the recent Club Scrap kit, Vogue. The heart is from Kitchen Sink Stamps new set Sweet Heart Roses. I decided to keep it simple since The sentiment and image says it all.

Cheers and Happy New Year!

Happy Kitchen Sink Stamp Monday and Happy New Year! I am so excited to be the Guest Designer this month for a stamp company that I have truly grown to love. My card was made using the new release Multi-step Champagne Celebration. There's nothing like a little taste of the bubbly to help celebrate a new year. I decided to keep it simple. Gold and black are such elegant colors and go so well with champagne. I did add glossy accents over the champagne glasses for that added glass effect.

Hopefully you have had a chance to visit the new KSS forum. The New Year's Eve kick-off was so much fun. It's obvious that a lot of work went into getting the forum up and running. Keep checking there for information and fun activities.

A new month means a new challenge at KSS. (From now on the new challenges will be announced in the forum.) This month Maria is challenging us to create a card (using KSS stamps) in 10 minutes or less. I didn't time my card this week, but I probably would have made it if I had all my paper pulled out and we didn't count the drying time of the glossy accents. Why don't you play along with our challenge for fun and upload your creation to the KSS gallery using the keyword: KSCC31. Hope to see you there.

Thanks so much for stopping by. I hope you will visit the other Design Team Members to see what delightful creations they have made. Cheers!

Angela * Connie * Julie * Lisa * Lynn * Makiko * Maria

Color Recipes: (All inks are Adirondack unless noted.)
Champagne glasses -- 1 sandal, 2 peach bellini stamped off, 3 peach bellini, 4 starlite silver (Brilliance)
Bubbles -- 1 sandal, 2 peach bellini
Sentiment -- embossing ink, embossed with gold powder.

Compendium of Curiosities Challenge 25

I haven't been posting as much lately, but I'm back for the New Year.
I have two exciting announcements. I am  now a Design Team member for Artistic Outpost stamps. I am so happy since I love AO stamps so much. And I am a Guest Designer for Kitchen Sink Stamps for the month of January. The KSS stamps are also some of my favorites.
Here's today's blog image.

The Compendium of Curiosities challenge this week is Scribble Stain Distress from p. 34 of Tim's book. I thought that I would use some brighter ink for the background, so I went with Fired Brick along with Tattered Rose and Dried Marigold. The background was stamped with stamps from Tim's regal findings and slight alterations sets. The bird cage and bird were die cut. The ticket and sentiment are stamped from odds and ends. It feels good to be back doing challenges.

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

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

Kitchen Sink Stamps Crew Challenge 29-2

I am in love with this little (or not so little) fellow. He is perfect for an atc and perfect for a monochromatic challenge. Both the image and the sentiment are from the Kitchen Sink Stamps set, Lil' Elephant. Color Recipe:
Elephant -- 1 London fog (Memento), 2 dove gray (Staz-On), 3 smokey gray (Versafine), 4 jet black (Adirondack)

Kitchen Sink Stamps Crew Challenge 29

The Kitchen Sink Stamps Crew Challenge  this month is monochromatic. Being fall, I thought this handsome turkey and falling leaves would make a great image for a monochromatic card. I used stamps from both Turkey Trot and Owl & Autumn Moon.
Color recipes: (All inks are Adirondack)
Turkey -- 1 sandal, 2 hazelnut, 3 espresso
Branch -- 1 latte, 2 hazelnut, 3 raisin
Leaves -- 1 latte, 2 rust

Play Date Cafe Challenge 52

This week Play Date Cafe is celebrating its one year anniversary. Congratulations for a year of fun challenges! The challenge this week is to use colors influenced by the image on the left...orange? yellow? pink? our choice. I had a few thoughts which influenced my card. First, it's near the end of October and I wanted to do at least one card for "Breast Cancer Awareness Month", and I had the ribbon stamp from Kitchen Sink Stamps, as well as the sentment stamps. I wanted to use my rosette die from the Tim Holtz collection. I had crepe paper ribbon which I thought would look good with the rosette. I sprayed it pink using glimmer mist and then I died the other ribber with distress ink. When I saw the image and the color choices, I immediately thought of the antique wallpaper technique from  the June/July Technique Junkies newsletter. Putting all those thoughts together, I came up with this card. To finish it off I used Rock Candy stickles to sparkle up the rosette.

Color Throwdown Challenge 115

It's Halloween time in the city.  The challenge from Color Throwdown are the colors dusty durango, perfect plum, and so saffron. Laura is still in the Halloween spirit and I seem to be to. I thought it would fun to do Halloween from a city perspective. I did my background with a Michele Zindorf influence--brayering. The moon and witch are done with Kitchen Sink Stamps from the Owl and Moon and Friends of the Moon sets. The cityscape is from Stamp Camp.
Color recipe: (all Adirondack ink)
Moon -- 1 lemonade, 2 sunshine yellow, 3 butterscotch
Witch -- jet black

Halloween ATC --- KSS 28

This is an atc I completed for a swap. It is a perfect match for this month's Crew Challenge at Kitchen Sink Stamps. The theme is "Trick or Treat" -- make something Halloween related using Kitchen Sink Stamps. I used stamps from several of the KSS stamp sets. The bushel basket and pumpkins are from Harvest. The moon and bats are from Owl & Autumn Moon. The witch is from Friends of the Moon.
Color Recipes: (All inks are Adirondack)
Moon -- 1 lemonade, 2 sunshine yellow, 3 butterscotch
Bushel basket -- 1 sandal, 2 pebble, 3 ginger, 4 espresso
Pumpkins -- 1 sandal, 2 sunshine yellow, 3 sunset orange, 4 rust
Bats and Witch -- jet black archival

Happy Boo Day

Color Throwdown Colors

Critter Sketch Challenge Sketch

This is a card I created for several challenges. I have been out of town; my daughter has been ill; and I've been keeping an eye on my two grandchildren. I had to combine the challenges in order to meet the deadlines. I did try to follow each of the challenges as closely as possible. I hope I did justice to the different challenges.

Critter Challenge had a sketch for its challenge. Color Throwdown challenged us to use perfect plum, early expresso, and vanilla in our work. The challenge theme for Created Byhand was "Long Night Moon...Silver". The monthly Crew Challenge for Kitchen Sink Stamps is "Trick or Treat", a Halloween theme.

This card was fun to create. The sketch was challenging, but fun. I made a few slight variations, but these were for artistic effect. For example, instead of flowers I used ghosts. I don't have a scallops die, but I think the label die I used works well. I followed the Color Throwdown colors very closely (although I don't have Stampin' Up colors)  The only variation was the silver moon for the Created Byhand challenge and the black ink stamping. The brown background is Core'dination paper which I embossed with the spider web folder and then sanded. The base card and stamped panels are on ivory cardstock.

The ribbon is Halloween tissue tape from Tim Holtz. The panels were stamped with Kitchen Sink Stamps. Most of the images were from Owl and Autumn Moon. The sentiment is a combination of words from Ready 4 any Holiday. Color recipes: (All inks used are Adirondack unless noted.)

Moon -- 1 summer sky-Memento, 2 London Fog-Memento, 3 starlight silver-Brilliance

Branch -- 1 sandal, 2 pebble, 3 expresso

Own -- 2 pebble, 1 sandal, 3 caramel, 4 expresso

Witch and Bats -- jet black archival

Bloggers Challenge 168 Created By Hand

I love it when everything comes together. This week the challenge theme at Bloggers Challenge is Autumn or Fall. The challenge at Created by Hand is Thanks. And, Kitchen Sink Stamps has started back with the monthly challenges with the theme Ushering In Fall.
To create this card I used the Pulled Glimmers technique from the June/July 2010 Technique Junkies newsletter for the background. I combined images from KSS sets: Trees, Big Leaves, and Harvest. I do love the colors of Fall.
Color recipes: All inks used are Adirondack
Tree -- 1 juniper, 2 sunshine yellow, 3 sunset orange, 4 rust
Leaf 1 -- 1 juniper, 2 sunshine yellow, 3 caranek
Leaf 2 -- 1 butterscotch, 2 sunshine yellow, 3 rust
Acorns -- 3 expresso, 2 caramel, 1 butterscotch

Color Throwdown Challenge 103

This week the challenge for Color Throwdown was to use the colors certainly celery, riding hood red, and river rock. For my card I used a cuttlebug frame I picked up at the CHA Super Show yesterday. I couldn't resist. The rose and saying are from Kitchen Sink Stamps.
Color recipe: (All inks are Adirondack dye inks unless noted.)
Rose -- 2 lady bug [Memento], 1 salmon, 3 ruby [Club Scrap], 4 rust
Leaves -- 1 willow, 2 lettuce, 3 meadow

Created By Hand Challenge 07-19-2010

This week the challenge at Created Byhand is "Looking in...Looking Out/Use Dies". The background of my card was cut using a Tim Holtz Alterations die Baroque and grungepaper. Instead of the actual die cut, I used the reverse as a frame. To color the frame I used my pan pastels. The result is a frame that looks and feels like suede. WOW!  I also used a reverse die cut as a template for the blue geometric behind the butterfly image. The butterfly and hydrangeas are stamped using Kitchen Sink Stamps.
Color recipes: All inks used are Adirondack dye inks.
Butterfly -- 1 sunshine yellow, 2 sunset orange, 3 expresso
Flowers (stamped out of order) -- 3 purple twilight, 2 cool peri, 1 shell pink and then restamped with cool peri, 4 currant.
Leaves -- 1 willow, 2 citrus, 3 lettuce

Created By Hand Challenge 07-13-2010

The theme challenge this week at Created ByHand is “Freedom…Stars” and this is the card I created. I just received a set of stamps from Club Scrap and this sentiment was one of the stamps. When I saw it, I immediately thought Freedom of Speech and the card was begun. The stars and swirls stamps,from Kitchen Sink Stamps, are stamped in pearl beige brilliance ink. The sentiment is stamped on wood paper.