Curtain Call: Sunflower Surprise

Hi there! I'm taking a break from cleaning and sharing a card with you for Curtain Call Challenge: Sunflower Surprise. Curtain Call Challenge was my first ever design team! I remember being soooo excited when Stacy asked me to join. I had only started card making then so I was a bit nervous as well. But my team members were all so great that it was absolutely wonderful to be a part of the team. I had wanted to join since their very first challenge, but I've been busy. So finally, here I am! 

Here's the inspiration photo. And here's my card. I combined a lot of stamp sets from 5 stamp companies! YES! 5! I wonder if you can tell which ones. lol.

I stamped this lush background and added shading with a brush and some ink pads. I just had an acrylic block where I pressed my ink pad and another where I had water. Then I used a small brush to make the shaded areas of the leaves and flowers. What do you think?

 After the background dried, I added my sunflowers using foam tape. My cards have become less layered than before. But a lot of times, I still can't stand it being flat (one layered), so I always try to add an element with foam tape.

There you go! I'm so glad for card challenges! If you haven't read my posts lately, I've been in a creative slump lately. Sadly, I've been watching more tv than spending time on my craft table. This wonderful challenge brought me out of my slump! I had a lot of fun with it! Thanks for stopping by today! I'll see you again soon! 

Oooh! Before I forget! I have a new tutorial over at A Cherry On Top. Check it out over here. It's a tutorial on how I made those beautiful Perfect Pearls vellum feathers. 

The Shabby Tea Room - Week 181

Hello! Looks like things are back to being a little quiet around here. It's probably a good thing, because I've been spending nights sitting at my craft table having a hard time coming up with anything! What do you do when you're having a dry spell? Stamp releases usually do it for me. But since we've just finished the releases, I hope I can find something to kick start my crafty mojo.

Let's see if this one will give it a go. It's week 181 over at The Shabby Tea Room. It's also my last week as their month long guest designer for August. Hopefully, you've enjoyed my card submissions and have had the time to join us. 

For this week's challenge, you have to use the colors found in our inspiration photo. As well as have a "tea" themed project.

For my card, I took the floral theme of our little tea picnic and made a background with it on my card. I used WPlus9 Embroidered Bouquet. I stamped the stems in green and stamped the flowers in colors I took from the inspiration photo. 

I stamped and hand cut a few of the flowers so that I could adhere them with foam tape to give a bit of dimension to my card.

As for my tea theme, I used Tea for Two from PTI. It's not visible in my photos, but I used so Wink of Stella on the tea pot as well as the centers of the flowers. They added a bit of bling to my project.

I've enjoyed being a part of The Shabby Tea Room even for a short while. I hope you liked my submissions too! If you have some inky time this week, please join us! Thank you so much for stopping by today! I'll see you again soon! :)

The Shabby Tea Room - Week 180

Hi there! It's going to be a bit busy around here again. I have a release feature and some challenges for this week. So let's start with a challenge! It's Monday again, and time for another The Shabby Tea Room Challenge. 

If you've only joined me today, I've been guest designing for TSTR this month of August. Here's our inspiration photo for this week. The challenge is to use the colors in the inspiration photo as well as to use fabric flowers in your project.

Here's my interpretation of the inspiration photo. If you look closely at the photo it looks like the dress actually has small pinstripes on it. So I made a pinstripe background for my card as well using my pinstripe background stamp from WMS. And instead of having lace, I heat embossed a clock face from Hands of Time on my background paper. 

I wanted a vine that looks like it was crawling on top of the clock face so I took my Harvest Berries, die cut it, stamped it and adhered it with foam tape over the background panel. The vine was a perfect place to position my silk flowers.

And I absolutely love this cute little fox from Hello Foxy. It was a perfect addition to my little card. The sentiments from Bigger Blooms are some of my favorites, so of course I had to add it here. 

There you go! My card for The Shabby Tea Room - Week 180. I hope you enjoyed it. Please join us for a little inky fun over at The Shabby Tea Room! See you there! :)

The Shabby Tea Room - Week 179: Vegetable Garden

Hello there! I'm back for The Shabby Tea Room Week 179. If you've only just checked in now, I'm the lucky month long guest designer over at The Shabby Tea Room! I hope you join us this week! 

This week's theme is Vegetable Garden. I was really lucky because I had just added the Vegetable Garden stamp set from PTI a week or two before I received the inspiration photos. This was a bit of a challenge for me though. But then, this is a card challenge after all! So grab your vegetable stamps and take the challenge! :)

I grabbed my Vegetable Garden stamp set and started by creating a background patterned paper. I didn't stop there though. I wanted to make the images glossy. So after stamping the images, I heat set them and then heat embossed them with clear embossing powder. 

The only thing I didn't like about embossing the images were that they darkened after the embossing. So if you're going to try this, make sure to use lighter shades of ink if you don't want your images too dark.

There you go! Are you ready to take this challenge?  Please join us over at The Shabby Tea Room! Don't forget to head on over to the other DT ladies' blogs for more inspiration! Thank's for stopping by today! I'll see you again soon! :)

Stamping Royalty 2013 Blog Hop

Hi there! Welcome to the Stamping Royalty 2013 Blog Hop!!! If you just came from Jennifer's blog then you're right where you're supposed to be. If not, please start from the top with Natasha's blog! Don't forget to leave comments along the way! Prizes are being offered up on EACH blog!!! :) 

Here's what I'm giving away! It's a portion of my prize that I wanted to share with my crafty online friends. So make sure to leave a comment. You can do so until 11:59pm EST on July 23. The winners will be announced on Wednesday, July 24.

My category for this hop is Christmas/Season's Greetings. I wanted to pay tribute to the stamp company that helped me win my first ever Stamping Royalty contest! It's none other than Papertrey Ink! For my card today, I used Tag-its #9, Mehndi Medallion Mini, Santa Stationery, and Christmas Labels.

 I used Tag-its #9 to create my background. Stamping them in with PTI's Spring Moss and Aqua Mist. As well as Hero Arts Soft Granite. Two of the wreaths were made by using heat n' stick embossing powder and then coating it with fine glitter. 

 I also wanted to add glitter to the label. So I used glue and lined the inner portion of the label and spread some glitter on it. I put it over a bed of burlap and some baker's twine.

There you go! If you're all done here, you can head on over to Alicia's blog now. :) Thanks for stopping by today! I'll see you again soon! :)

Natasha Kara

Lalo Ik

Courtney Kelley

Katie Gehring

Jennifer Rzasa

Jean Martin

Alicia Thelin

Sarah J. Moerman

Joni Andaya

Nina Yang

Emily Leiphart

Pamela Ho

Amy Kolling

Ilina Crouse

Shelly Kurth

Sketchbook Saturday Challenge 100

Hi there everyone! We're in Newport with our friends and having a nice time in the sun. But I did have some time to sneak in a little challenge or two. Our fearless leader and good friend Chupa is celebrating her 100th sketch over at Sketchbook Saturday Challenge. Of course I had to celebrate it with her!!! So here we go!

I used my Papertrey Ink stamps for today's project. I made this with the Mini Blooms stamp set and die. As well as Happiness in Bloom.

I won't go into detail about my card as I'm just sneaking this in between all the sun and swimming. lol! I'll be back on Thursday with another card!

Thanks for stopping by today! I'll see you all again soon! :)

A little tutorial

Hi there friends! I hope those living in the US had a nice July 4th celebration yesterday. We're headed off for a little vacation to Rhode Island this Sunday until Friday of next week. Aside from my weekly CASE Study Challenge cards, the blog will probably be a little quiet. But make sure you come back right after because it's going to get busy again as soon as we get back! :)

I do have a little sneak peek I wanted to share with you. I was recently contacted by Heidi from A Cherry on Top to make some card tutorials for the readers on their forum. I was thrilled and excited to be asked. :) My first tutorial is already up! So if you have some time, please hop on over there and take a look! :)  

Here's a little sneak peek of what's in store!

I would also love to hear from you! If you have any ideas of what kind of tutorials you'd like to see please drop me a line! Thanks for stopping by today! :)

Obsessed with Florals

Hi there! I promised I would have a card for you today! I got so many emails and messages from people who loved my floral cards from the latest WPlus9 Release! I'm so happy to read all your kind words! This is a floral card, but not using Fresh Cut Florals. I apologize. My PTI order just came in and I wanted to play around with my new stamps. But I promise to make another card using Fresh Cut Florals for a little bit more inspiration for everyone.

This whole card was made with PTI's Happiness in Bloom stamp set. I absolutely loved it when I saw Nichole's samples during the release previews. I also got a few emails asking me about what inks that I normally use. I use Hero Arts Shadow Inks, PTI Inks, and WPlus9 Pigment Inks. :)

While I was making this card, I was suddenly reminded of my best friend back home. This sentiment had her name all over it. I miss her a lot! :(

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this. I'll be back again for more cards soon! :)

Inks: HA - Soft Cantaloupe, Soft Pink, Fresh Peach, Soft Granite, Wet Cement, Cup O Joe

       PTI - Simply Chartreuse, Ripe Avocado

       Versafine - Onyx Black

Lawnscaping Challenge 59

Hi there! Happy Saturday! I hope we're all off to a good start. My DH and I are going to a birthday party for a little 1 year old today. I thought it would be nice to make a card for her to put a gift certificate in. I thought this would be a perfect chance to practice some more on my Lawn Fawn stamps. And what better way to find out if I'm doing it right than to join a Lawn Fawn challenge! :) This is for Lawnscaping Challenge #59. 

The theme is coloring. And it is absolutely perfect since I just got my Inktense pencils! I have been practicing every chance I get. It's really quite fun so you can imagine that I have a ton of paper scraps with colored in images. :)

For my card today, I kept it neutral. Not for the lack of trying to make it colorful! lol! I tried to color the sheep pink and the blue. But in the end I liked it in white the best! These images are from Critters on the Farm. I hope they come up with dies for this soon! The sentiment is from PTI Tremendous Treats: Birthday. And the background is from Hero Arts.

Here's what the inside looks like. There's a little tab for a gift certificate card. It's a shame really, DH and I usually just end up with gift certificates because we can't decide what to get. I guess it's not so bad, at least whoever we give the certificate to can decide on their own.

I made a little tab and adhered it onto the card base. But before that, I stamped another sheep and a sentiment on it. I used a white marker to outline the sheep in the beginning. But then I changed my mind and colored it in with Inktense pencils. It didn't come out as well as I had planned though. But still, it looks ok. :)

Ok that's it! Thanks for stopping by today! Come back again tomorrow. I have another card to share! :)

Happy Mother's Day

Hi there! I have a card for a very special woman today. It's for my wonderful mom. A sister who worked hard to put her brothers and sisters through school. A daughter who worked hard to give her a family a better life. A mom who worked hard to make sure her daughters would not go through the hardships she did when she was younger. A mom who is always kind and soft spoken. MY MOM. My mom who loves God so very much. And whom God loves very much too because she would not have survived 2 aneurysms if not for Him. I'm grateful for every day that she's here with us. I miss her every day and wish that I wasn't half way across the world.

I LOVE YOU MOM! 

I was at Barnes and Noble this morning and saw a beautiful card with lovely embossing. I wanted to try to make my own version of it. This is what I came up with...

For this card, I used Rosie Posie from Papertrey Ink. I stamped some of the flowers and shaded them with Copic markers. I also heat embossed the rest of the flowers in white. I wanted to use my blending tool to give a beautiful aqua shade to the card. The embossed white flowers stand out quite beautifully this way. The sentiment is from A Special Lady by WPlus9.

As I was making this post, I realized that my older sister Cathy is just like my mom. She has three rowdy boys who always keeps her on her toes. And she also works so hard to make sure that they have a good life and a good education. I'm very proud of her! :) Happy Mother's Day Ach! :)

Well, that's it for today! Thanks for stopping by! I wish all the mom's out there a Happy, Happy Mother's Day!