CCC22 with Snowman

Alcohol Ink Splatter is one of my favorite techniques and it is this week's Compendium of Curiosities Challenge theme. (See p52) in Tim's book for the how-to. Since I wanted to use the snowman die with my card, I used somewhat lighter alcohol inks and silver for my metallic. Oops, more silver came out than was supposed to, but I really like how this turned out. Lucky accident! Another bit of luck was the theme for Created Byhand--Snowmen! I have every version of Tim's snowman. I think he's so cool.  The movers and shapers die (LOVE) really adds a great touch to my friend the snowman.

Critter Sketch Challenge 40 and Simon Says Stamp and Show

I love it when a card comes together the way I pictured it in my head. First the challenges... At Critter Sketch the challenge is texture.The trees are embossed using a texture fade embossing folder. The deer is die cut using grunge paper which is texture in itself. Then I colored the deer with pan pastels. I love the feel of grunge colored with pan pastels, it's like suede. Honestly this was an easy challenge for me because most of what I create has some texture. It's what I love to do.
At Simon Says Stamp and Show the challenge theme is Whatever Makes You Happy. How many times have I used the word "love" in this posting so far? Well, let me add that I also love embossing Shimmer Sheetz to create a background. The sentiment is from Stampscapes; it kind of gives a finishing touch to the warm feeling I get from the card. What makes me happy? -- Creating a card using the tools, materials, and techniques I love and having it turn out the way I wanted it to. Yep, I'm a happy camper tonight.

Sunday Stamper Week 129

This week for the Ink on My Fingers Sunday Challenge, Hels had the theme Santa Claus is Coming to Town. For this challenge Hels made an Advent Book. My project is also a book of sorts, actually a maze book in a box. In front on my picture is the top of the box. In the box several pages can be seen, two of which are types of Santas. The pages of the book are chipboard held together by jump rings. The images are all vintage Christmas image which I adhered to the chipboard. There are a few stamped Christmas greeting throughout the book.

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)

Play Date Cafe Challenge 55

 This week Play Date Cafe gave us a color challenge using red, pale blue, pink, bright blue, and burgundy. I found a piece of designer paper in my stash which touched on these colors; however, the colors were very pale and washed out. I wanted to make a birthday card which looked like a celebration. I used my Creative Inspirations paints to brighten up the paper. I used finger sponges, dipped them in the paint, and highlighted the dots on the paper. Now instead of dull and drab, I think the paper yells, "CELEBRATE" The image (Club Scrap) was stamped in pink and decorated with CI paints. The sentiment was created with my label maker in open print and then highlighted with the paints. These colors made a very festive birthday card.

Just Because

I love it when theme and color challenges work together. The challenge at Color Throwdown was to use the colors soft suede, cherry cobbler, and kraft in your art. At Created Byhand the theme was corners. I have to admit that the colors had me baffled for a while. However, first I found this stamp from Club Scrap and the wheels started to turn. Then because I don't have these exact colors and since kraft and soft suede are very close, I had to find something that worked. Creative Inspirations paints came to the rescue. The tan paint was very close to soft suede. An added benefit is that the image just pops because of the shimmer.  I used the Fiskars corner and border punch around the focal image. I used the corner punch again on the cherry background. I adhered the image layer and background layer to a kraft card base and stamped "Just Because" four times around the image panel. Now I have a colorful card with decorative corners. Works for me.

Compendium of Curiosities Challenge 21 and Simon Says Stamp & Show

The Compendium of Curiosities Challenge was to use the Perfect Distress technique from p. 38 of Tim's book. Simon Says Stamp & Show wanted us to use our favorite Tim stamp.This was a match made in heaven. The only difficult thing was to choose a favorite. My favorite Tim Holtz stamp is whichever one I am using at the time. Okay, so I decided on the flowers and bird stamps from Nature's Moments. I really do love these and use them often. I think these stamps worked well with the technique.