Let It Snow Black, White and Red????

Hi guys! The latest Christmas card I have to share is one for my record books.

Mention snow and I think Blue and White or Silver. I never thought I'd ever be making a Christmas snow card in the colors I did, but Black and White + one color was the challenge and so I thought, I will look through the collage sheet images I already have printed and if I see one I can use for this, then I am in! And I found this sweet Gecko Galz image!

On a 5.5" square card base, I framed the image with a Spellbinders scalloped rectangle and added some sheer white ribbon and papers from Lawn Fawn's Snow Day pack.

For the back of the card, I took some of the same white card stock as the card base and ran a 5" square of it through a Darice 5x7 Snowflakes embossing folder. Then I used my leftover paper scraps to die cut some elements for the little signature.

I finished the card off by stamping Let It Snow on the image with a Flourishes stamp in black Versafine ink. (LOVE that it looks just like it is part of the image.) I then embellished the snowy parts with some Star Dust Stickles glitter glue. I think it turned out super! But you could not have convinced me it would beforehand, lol, no sireeeee! That will teach me hopefully. ;-) 

I am joining in the following challenges with this card:

1. 52 Christmas Card Throwdown August Color Challenge - Use Black & White + One Colour

2. Christmas Cards All Year Round August Challenge - Use war/hot colors (I used RED with black and white)

3. Addicted to Stamps and More Photo Inspiration Challenge #305 - (I used inspiration from the red berries and the white and black  of the coconut)

4. Crafty Gals Corner Challenge #172 - Add a Ribbon &/or Bow (I added a sheer white ribbon down the center front)

5. The Merry Christmas Challenge 8/15 - 9/14 - Anything Christmas

6. Christmas at Sweet Stampin August Challenge - Anything Christmas

Well, I hope everyone got past Hump Day and here's to smooth sailing into TGIF and the weekend. Thursday, please be kind! Thanks for making my art a part of your day. xoxoxo

Multi-post Tuesday: Thank you card #2

I'm Baaaack! Here is my other Thank you card.

I began with the Teesha Moore collage sheet image. I wanted to use tropical colors like yellow, orange, green, and I knew my old Junkitz paper stash would work and also be a nice compliment to Teesha's playful Zetti image. 

I searched my Thank You stamps and found the cute Wordsworth Stamps hand-written child-like sentiment and then the Avery Elle tiny big huge thanks sentiment stamp. The friend we are giving this to will very much appreciate the silly humor.

Before layering my card front matts I took the time to edge all of them in dark grey ink, even the image. I love this humorous card and hope to try my hand at more like them.

I want to join the following challenges with this card:

Crafty Gals Corner Challenge #171 - Use TROPICAL COLORS

Eclectic Ellapu August Challenge - FRIENDS FROM AFAR (share what you've sent friends)

LTCCB Challenge #25 - ANYTHING GOES

Thank you for reading two posts today and for your visit to let me share my art with you. xoxo

Multi-post Tuesday: Thank you card #1

Greetings Guys and Galz! I'll be posting twice today, which is what happens when you just have to do 2 cards for the same challenges. One entry = one post on most of the challenge rules. So, please bear with me. They're helping me get stuff made. :-) Until they don't anymore, lol, but right now is golden (like this card, haha).

I've a need for some thank you cards to send for Honey's retirement gifts he has received. And I cut this scalloped heart die from yellow/gold shimmer card stock quite a long time ago and have grown tired of pushing it out of the way in my Bits n Bobs box. Time to use! 

Wanted to show this die because it truly is Old School, hahaha. LOVE (not) the baby bottle heading where the Sizzix is. Now THAT dates a die, haha. Thank goodness the real die cut is not so old-looking.

I didn't spend my usual way-too-much-time on this card, kept it simple. I used Tim's Tattered Banners die for the flags to stamp the sentiments. For some reason, I wanted to use my Cornucopia Versa Magic chalk ink on it and for inking the edges of my DCWV Collage Art paper that I also distressed. 

I won't get into the weeds, but after I cut my paper, I didn't like that there were no little flowers in the top left hand corner like there are in the bottom right hand corner. So brave me says, I have little flower silhouette stamps, I'll stamp some. My game plan was to do it all with my chalk inks, including simulating some gesso on top by using my white chalk ink. AND IT WORKED, I think. If I hadn't told you, would you have known or guessed? I really need to get into using my chalk inks more before they all dry up or something, because they are kind of cool in a subtle way. And I love how they dry pretty permanent.

A side view.

I am joining the following challenges with this card:

LTCCB Challenge #25 - ANYTHING GOES

Eclectic Ellapu August Challenge  - FRIENDS FROM AFAR (sending this to friend)

LTSCB Challenge #112 - OLD SCHOOL (my cutesy and old Sizzix heart die) 

Well, that is it for this post. Stay tuned for one more later on before noon! Thanks for stopping by! xoxo

Bingo! Tag Tuesday

Here I am again, twice in one day? That rarely happens! 

But, I am trying to post my winnings from a blog challenge as I also participate in another blog challenge at the same blog, so they will see I got my goodies and am so pleased with them. I have gone right to the deadline getting my piece done, so I had to post again so soon.

First to the goodies I won: Valerie and the crew at Tag Tuesday was so sweet to send me this package for winning their Floral Challenge several weeks ago. I looooove everything Valerie sent! Especially the beautiful floral tag she made, which is hanging on a display in my foyer at present. The hibiscus looks perfect for summer. Isn't that lamb napkin cute? Thanks so much! 

And here is my tag I am entering into their current challenge, Bingo. I tried a new way to do the top to thread some lace or ribbon through. The green piece is only glued at the bottom edge on the front and back, so I can slip fiber through. I haven't yet though, as I decided that the tags I make might be good to put on cards. I thought since it's still just August, I could wait to decide which tags I wanted to use as decorations for my art corner. The others I get made can go on cards. At any rate, these two little fairies would look adorable either place. For now, they are participating in the Tag Tuesday Bingo Challenge. :-) 

Materials:

Images: Lisa's Altered Arts, Gecko Galz

Paper: Karen Foster

Velvet Ric-rac: Chatterbox

Well, that's it for now. I'll be back tomorrow. Thanks for visiting me and allowing me to share my art with you! xoxoxo

Golden Gilded Cages

Hello again! Just popping in to share my latest ScriptureDex Rolo card, as I am trying to get caught up with these. This one is for the -gasp- current challenge, but I think I have 5 more previous ones to be completely caught up.

This week's challenge theme at Think Monday Think ATC is Golden (gilded) Cage. Include one on your ATC or Rolo. Well, I immediately thought of this poem, which is one of my favorite poems from one of my favorite poets:

LOVE so much about it, but one is the vivid imagery Angelou conjers up, by comparing the free bird and the caged bird, thereby letting you really feel how a caged bird feels and ergo why he opens his throat to sing.

So, I showed the contrast of a flock of free birds flying with a bird in a gilded cage, wanting to be free like the others. I heat-embossed the stamped cage first, to create a resist for the sponged-on distress inks. Then I stamped the flock in archival ink after sponging the distress inks with my Tim tool..  

Usually, I print out any text I do not have a stamp for on paper or card stock, but just for grins this time I decided to scan in my Rolo, open it up in PSE and then type in where I wanted the text of the verse to go, and then I printed out the Rolo with my inkjet printer on a 4x6 matte photo card (one of the many extras you get when you have an Epson PictureMate and have to buy the ink and paper kit.)

Then I cut out my verse text line by line and re-assembled on my real Rolo. The coloring was a bit off but I do love that the colored text strips blend into my Rolo background. Did not even realize until afterward that I could have chosen ANY color for the text, lol. Oh well, next time!

For the Rolo back, I heat-embossed my stamp images as well. I tried sprinkling some navy blue ep and then some green and melting it all at once. Turned out imperfectly cool, I thought. But I needed a little more so I found a flourish stamp with musical notes and heat embossed that in yellow. So, this is what my card looked like after creating my ep resist before sponging with distress inks.

...and after sponging with distress inks! A few torn bits of washi on front and back and done. The deep vivid colors and lush vegetation reminds me of summer, too.

The challenges I am joining with this Rolo:

1. Think Monday Think ATC - GOLDEN (GILDED) CAGE

2. Craftaholics R Us Challenge #32  - Use YELLOW

3. Take A Word Challenge - SILHOUETTE

4. Moo Mania Challenge - SUMMERTIME

5. Try it on Tuesday - INSPIRED BY A SONG

6. A Vintage Journey August Challenge - HOW CAN YOU RESIST?

I thank you very much for visiting me and allowing me to share my art with you! 

I hope we all have a cool, dry, artistic week ahead! I plan to make that happen for me by staying in the a/c and making art as much as possible! 

Oh, and we finally got all our retirement paperwork and financial advisor visits done for the time being and I couldn't be happier about that! 

See ya again soon, xoxoxo