Smile

This card was bumping around in my head and needed to get out!  I don't think anyone inspired me with it - and the part I like the best is probably because of a mistake that needed to be covered up!  I stamped the camera image on a piece of white cardstock with Momento Tuxedo Black ink and let it dry.  I should have done the liquid glass on the camera lens at that time - it would have kept me from messing about with the page too fast and letting the ink run with too much water coloring.  But, the only spot that looked really "bad" is underneath the speech bubble! Next time, I'll do things in a better order!

I love this card!

State stamps

I have several of the State Stamps now - and even a few of the Canadian provinces - to use in card-making and scrapbooking.  I was trying to design a simple card with the focal point on the map of Hawaii.  I found a left-over post-stamp frame that I'd made a couple of years ago (I never throw these things away!) and decided it would look cool around the image.  The design papers are retired.

the little "Love" sentiment is from Friendly Wishes.  

Hug me!

When this stamp set of cacti and thin cuts to match came out last Winter, I jumped on it!  I live in the desert half of the year - and have grown to love our desert plants.  This card was inspired by Jody Gustafson.  I used my own patterned papers, ink/cardstock choices, and added the sentiment in the new Pansy color - very pretty!  I added some sparkle with a glitter pen but I'm not sure that actually shows up.

I think I'll use this for an Anniversary card!

Positive Chemistry - cased

I saw this fabulous card on a CTMH Consultant web-site and had marked it to come back to - in fact, I think it was the reason I bought this chemistry stamp set!  Well, that and I was a chemist in a former life.  LOL

The paper is a retired pack called Urban.  There are awesome masculine and interesting papers in this one. The corrugated metal look design paper had just a little help from some additional stamping with Positive Chemistry stamps.  The flasks were heat embossed with black, and watercolored (outside the lines on purpose!) - and some "haze" added inside the vessels.  I added a little sparkle to the bubbles.  It's not an exact copy of Laurie Varner's card, I changed 3 things, but the look is so close it would count as a copy!  Thanks Laurie for the inspiration!

Purr-fect Halloween - birthday card

Another kitty for you!  I may need an intervention here - I can't seem to put this stamp set away!  This time I paired it with some old birthday balloons, a bit of washi tape and left the kitty white.  Easy-peasy!  The card-base is Smoothie cardstock and the inks were Ruby, Thistle, and Smoothie.  

We are heading to the Minnesota State Fair this weekend!  I reserved a motorized scooter for myself - I can barely walk to the car these days and without the scooter I wouldn't be able to go at all to the fair.  We're taking Mike's family this weekend and the rest of Steve's family over Labor Day weekend.  It will be a blast - I'll have to wear my stretchy pants because I intend to eat fair food!  What is your favorite part of the fair?

This was inspired by Jen Rubio, at this blogsite.  I loved how Jen created a beach and colored her seashells with watercolors.  I used different papers, banner, and sentiments - but I thank Jen profusely for the inspiration!

I used the watercolor paints for my seashells and sometimes it seemed like the colors were covering up the details of the stamped image.  So, I went back over them with the 0.5 micron journaling pen.  I know I'm going to love having these images for my Hawaii scrapbooking! 

Purr-Fect Halloween (August Stamp of the Month)

The August stamp of the month can also be used for Halloween themes!  (I just love the little bats!) I used all CTMH products on this 3 x 5 1/2" tag.  The base cardstock was white, I just applied Sunset ink directly to the paper from the ink pad.  The coloring was done with my watercolor pencils.

August Stamp of the Month - Purr-fect Halloween

Another fun card using the Purr-fect Halloween stamp of the month set.  I love how fun this was to make, and that these stamps are so versatile. I'll try to make one that actually looks like Halloween to post also.  

Purr-fect

This is the August Stamp of the Month from CTMH.  It is billed as a Halloween stamp set - but it lends itself to many other designs - like this one that I'll use for a birthday card.  I used the Florence paper pack, and Peacock, Poppy, and Saffron ink colors - the kitty was colored gray with the ShinHan markers. 

These stamps are only available during August - so hurry if you think you want it!  Stamp of the Month specials are "D" size sets (purchase alone for $17.95) and you can get it for $5.00 for with a $50 order of other things.  

Safari Ballet (aka Dancing Hippos)

I have a special little girl in mind for this card!  It was inspired by another CTMH consultant, so I changed a few things to make it my own: the design paper, the sentiment, and the tutu's.  I used Momento Tuxedo Black ink on a piece of text paper (CTMH - long retired) and colored with my Derwent Intense water color pencils.  

Fun, fun, fun!  This stamp set also has a dancing giraffe!  Oh.My.  

A Masculine card

I have a few men in my life that love to be outdoors!  So, I had my eyes open for a hunting/fishing stamp set when CTMH released this brand new stamp set in the 2016-2017 Annual Inspirations catalog.  It's a "B" size stamp (only $9.95) and has Happy Birthday, Happy Retirement, For You, and It's Your Day sentiments.  

I stamped the image using Momento Tuxedo Black ink and colored with watercolors and the water brush.  When it was dry, I went back over it with the new CTMH Shimmer Brush pen.  I hope you can see the shimmer in the close up!  The woodgrain paper is one of the new designs in the Annual Inspirations book also.  I paired Sapphire cardstock and a piece of twine-ribbon from my stash.  The mostly forgotten stapler was pulled out to make a more "masculine" statement.  *giggle*  Hope you like it!

More gold embossing - Swirly Seashells

I was inspired by Nancy Ball to make this card with the brand new CTMH Swirly Seashells stamp set.  The "Happy" is from the scrapbook special last Autumn (I'm telling you, don't miss out on these specials!). There are lots of sentiments that would look great on this card, however. 

I used VersaMark and gold embossing powder to heat emboss the big shell that is popped up.  The design paper (Cashmere?) was random stamped with Saddle ink.  The Happy was stamped with Sapphire blue.

I watercolored the shell with three colors of blue and the deepest purple.  I started light and used a tissue to dab off excess.  Then going back (over and over) to bring in more color. 

I had a spinal injection yesterday and feel pretty good today (but my doctor said that might just be the novocaine they injected).  I am very optimistic that it will truly help! 

Gold Embossing and Watercolors

I've had several ideas floating around in my head that involve gold heat embossing of an open design, then watercoloring with the new CTMH paint set. Here is my first one. I used the Wavy Blooms D1651 (just retired?) and a sentiment from Verve. I first stamped the images of the flowers using VersaMark Clear and heat embossed with fine gold embossing powder. Then I set about watercoloring. The first night I fiddled and fiddled, and finally walked away from it. In the morning I was surprised to see it MUCH lighter than I thought I'd left it - so I began to layer in more color. This is when I thought to add some yellow to the upper left corner. The sentiment may have been snuggled a little too close to the flowers, but I still think it looks good. In order to flatten out the paper, I was heavy-handed with the adhesive and put it flat onto the card base (Colonial White).

Happy Truck

I've had this CTMH truck stamp for awhile without seeing any ink - so I made this card (masculine birthday?) with balloons from a CTMH business builder set called Party Time Gathering.  I stamped the balloons (all one stamp) in Champagne ink and then colored over each balloon in pencil, trying to keep the sketchy lines that were on the stamp images.  Then I used some wired black twine. The tire track stamp was used to make a "road" and the background wood-chevron design paper is one of the brand new CTMH Rustic Home Fundamentals. "HAPPY" is from the Hello, Life - Scrapbooking promotional stamp from Fall of 2015, no longer available. I used Sapphire ink for both the truck and the HAPPY and Slate ink for the "road".  

Love Doily (I've lost count)

This was another doily card!  I had a package of the design paper that I used for the card front that I bought from Paper Source over 5 years ago (I was going to use it as an element in my wedding invitations, then changed my mind).  I was afraid that the pearly flowers wouldn't accept the ink with stamping but I was happily surprised!  The inks for the doily and sentiment was Slate.  The poppies were stamped in black and cut out - it was a negative stamp and I don't know where I got it. It has a lot of dimension and was really fun to make - even with all the fussy cutting.

Love Doily

This card was also inspired by Pinterest.  I changed the colors, the sentiment and the doily stamp but the three panels are the same as the inspiration card.  I'm trying to make a little batch of Birthday cards here!  I think it would work with all sorts of color combinations, too - maybe soft neutrals for a sympathy card, primary for a congrats card, or even flower colors for a get well soon!  

I recently was browsing through my pinterest folders and realized that I had a LOT of great ideas for a doily stamp.  I have a doily stamp. I  didn't actually realize that but my recent organizing spree reminded me of it.  Out came the Love Doily stamp set and the Hello Tweety one, too. Neither stamp set have ever seen ink!  Isn't that crazy?!

So, I used Olive and Black, the border at the bottom is from Happy Journey and I think maybe that all three stamp sets are retired.  Even Olive is retired as a CTMH color. 

Then this happened.  I thought it might be nice to see what happened if I let the doily image fall off the paper.  I found nifty design papers in my "CTMH Retired" box and I changed the colors to Sweet Leaf, Chocolate with a whisp of Champagne.  I think the spacing is best on the "miss you" one, but the little bird flying off is a neat touch.  Anyway - there you go!  Doily stamp in use!

Happy Birthday!

This is a simple step card.  I used the Springtime Blossoms stamp set because I have the die cuts for that one and it saved me a lot of time cutting out all the blossoms and leaves!  The black patterned paper is a fundamentals and the cardstock base is Tulip.  I had a first attempt that I will NOT be posting (crude!) but I'm happy with this one!

Birthday critters

This was fun!  I was inspired by a card that had square windows - but I don't have all my die cuts in MN (they live in the AZ studio) and the best I could do was the hexagons.  The leaf die is call Lorelai Leaf and I have both the one you see here, and one that creates a branch with an open leaf (very cool!).  The papers and cardstock are all CTMH.  I used color pencils to color, and liquid glass on the eyeglasses of the little mouse.  So fun!  

I experienced my first tornado last night.  3 AM the local sirens went off - we scrambled out of bed and down to the basement (where I promptly fell back asleep - no kidding!).  I could feel the pressure in my ears - it was like a rapid descent in the airplane when you are a little congested. Slightly painful, and I couldn't hear a thing.  We were very lucky - just a few tree branches down and nothing hit our cars, house, shed, etc.  No real damages for our kids homes here either.  Whew!  

Happy To Be Friends

I saw a recent post that inspired these on Lisa Stenz' blog.  She is a CTMH consultant and inspired artist.  I left off some elements, and changed the sentiment.  The papers are Florence and the card with the yellow flower centers is the one where I used Glacier ink for the branches where the one with the Poppy color in the center of the flowers used the bolder Juniper color ink.  I like them both.  It's fun to make birthday cards!