Earth Day Challenge

My friend, Jan Hoefler, of Red Rubber Paper and Ink put out an April challenge in honor of Earth Day. It was to try and make some art using recycled materials. This is the card I created. The background is recycled corrugated cardboard packing and the red butterfly is die cut and embossed from a diet coke can (in fact, from a piece of a coke can left over from another project I did).

The background corrugated cardboard edges were distressed using my new Distrezz-It tool and sections of the top layer were peeled off. (Idea credit goes to Lisa Somerville.) Then I highlighted it with tumbled glass and rusty hinge distress inks. I dabbed some cream colored acrylic paint (left over from another project) over the inks. The butterfly collage stamp is from I Brake For Stamps. I embossed the image so I could use the antiqued glimmers technique from Technique Junkies. I used Adirondack markers to highlight the butterflies. The red butterfly was made by using the Cuttlebug butterfly die and then the embossing folder. Coloring was done with alcohol inks--red pepper and gold. The sentiment is from Artistic Outpost "Bluebird" and was stamped on a scrap of paper. Thanks Jan for the fun challenge!

Bloggers Challenge 149

This weeks Bloggers Challenge is to use some kind of embossing in our artwork. In my piece, I created the background using Shimmer Sheetz dry embossed in a Cuttlebug folder. The embossing is highlighted with Stazon. In real life, the background has deep cright colors of green, purple, and blue. It's a shiny mylar material so it doesn't scan true to life. Alice is also heat embossed and then colored with Copics. The stamps are from Artistic Outpost.

Try That Technique

This week we have been challenged to go Retro by the Technique Junkies Design Team. Retro is from the June 2003 Technique Junkies Newsletter. This card has interesting reason behind it. My uncle Len served in the service during WWII and has been invited to participate in Honor Flight Chicago. This organization honors WWII vets by flying them to Washington D.C. to visit the War Memorials. It's a one day trip and when they arrive home, the vets will be met with a a "Mail Call" of letters and cards thanking them for their service. this will be one of the cards he will be receiving. I thought that the retro technique and the Artistic Outpost Heroes stamps made a very appropriate card.

Color Throwdown Challenge 90

This week's Color Throwdown Challenge was to use the colors barely banana, rich rezzleberry, old olive, and pale plum. Color challenges often cause me to think. This time I started with the designer paper in the floral and the solid. That left me with the banana and olive colors to think about. This flower stamp from Auntie Amy was the perfect image. I used a waterbrush and Adirondack inks to color the flower. The card base is a banana yellow also. The sentiment is from Club Scrap.

Critter Sketch Challenge 11

This weeks Critter Sketch Challenge is a sketch with one other criteria. It has to have at least one button on it somewhere. I used stamps from OnyxXpressions. I love this cat stamp. To highlight it, I used alcohol inks for the polished stone technique background after masking the cat. The papers are from Club Scrap.

Try That Technique

Another week, another new, old technique. This week the challenge is to use the Graffitti technique from the December 2004 newsletter. It's an easy technique and is fun to do. I decided that I needed to do a thank you card. I did have to put away a lot of stamps and stamp pads when I was through. I had no idea how many "Thank you" stamps I had. And this wasn't all of them.

Play Date Cafe Challenge 26

This week's Play Date Cafe challenge is to use the colors clay, turquoise, cream, and silver or grey. My stamp is one of the newest stamps from Club Scrap. I thought the colors clay and turquoise were perfect for the stamp. The edges are torn and edged in silver ink. The flourishes and sentiment are silver outline stickers. Everything is mounted on a cream colored layer and then on a metallic silver card base. Of course, the scan shows the metallic silver areas in black and grey, but it has a metallic shine IRL.