PaperTrey Ink April Blog Hop: Focus on Masculine Projects

Hi and Happy Monday! I'm back with this month's PaperTrey Ink blog hop project, which is to create a project with a masculine focus. Here is my entry:

This card uses a masculine color combination of kraft, chocolate brown and moss green. I also incorporated some balsa wood for my focal point. I die cut a business card size of balsa wood I had in my stash with the Fillable Frames #7 die and stamped it with a leaf image from Turning a New Leaf and the sentiment from Fillable Frames #4. This was mounted on to a rounded corner piece of chocolate brown card stock and then adhered to a piece of moss green cardstock that I embossed with a Sizzix embossing folder (Country Foliage).

Thanks for stopping by! I look forward to seeing what you came up with for this challenge as well!

Have a good week!

Happy Easter!

Hi! Long time, no posts. I've been doing plenty of creating, just not so much posting. Hopefully today's post and tomorrow's post (the PTI blog hop!) will make up for my absence here. I've got four Easter cards to share today.

I've never considered my crafting style to be shabby chic, but then again I'm not sure I have a defined style. For me, the best part of crafting is exploring different styles and new techniques. However, lately I seem to be on a shabby chic kick. The older, vintage look appealed to me, so I made a series of vintage-inspired Easter cards.

For this card I tried out a Melissa Frances Vintage Embellishment, the bird nest. I'm not exactly sure what it's made of; I don't think it's resin, it has more of a clay-like feel to it, but I'm not sure if it's that either, and of course the packaging doesn't tell me anything. There were three embellishments included in the package (bird on branch, bird cage and bird nest), and they have a distressed white finish to them. I got out some pigment inks and swiped them over the nest and eggs to give them color. It was hard to get into the crevices, but I actually rather like having areas of white exposed. I layered the embellishment onto a PTI Doily Detail cut out. The little resin bird is from Webster's Pages. The vintage egg paper is also from Melissa Frances. The beautiful sentiment is from PTI's Birds of a Feather set. The round egg sticker is from K & Co's Flora & Fauna Typewriter Key Grand Adhesions set.

This next card has more vintage egg paper and a doily die cut. The bird image is from a Hampton Art clear set, Circle Birds. I think I picked it up at Michaels last year. The doily lace strip is from Basic Grey's Curio paper ribbon set. The sentiment is from PTI's Mega Mixed Messages set.

What's Easter without a bunny? The bunny image is from Inkadinkado. The Easter sentiment is from Memory Box. The flowers and leaves which I distressed with Color Box Creamy Brown ink are from the Boutique Fleur collection from Recollections at Michaels. I even dug out the colored pencils for this one! My pencils have been sadly ignored since I discovered Copic markers.

And finally, here is one with a chick. The chick image, colored with pencils, is also from Inkadinkado. Same sources as the bunny card above for the sentiment and flower embellishments.

That's all for today. Please stop back tomorrow for my PTI blog hop entry.

I hope you're having a wonderful weekend and enjoying a beautiful Easter!

Two Birds with One Stone

Happy Sunday! Most of us are familiar with the adage "Kill two birds with one stone." Well, I'm finding that I have to apply that to my crafting now. There simply isn't enough time for me to do all that I want to accomplish, so if there are two challenges I want to participate in, I try to come up with one card that will fulfill both challenges. I was able to do that with this card:

This card is for this week's Make It Monday challenge, which is to partially impress a card element, and the current PaperTrey Playhouse challenge which is to make a card inspired by your favorite season. Although you can't see it at all in the photo, the Lemon Tart paper is partly impressed with the canvas impression plate. And since Fall is my favorite season, I made a card with fall flowers (dahlias) and fall colors.

Hope your weekend is going well. I met a friend this morning for a walk and then we went and had manicures and pedicures at a nearby salon. Even though we only live about 30 minutes from each other, I haven't seen her in almost a year, so we had a lot of catching up to do! I have a new soup recipe I'm trying out (Morroccan Chickpea) and it's simmering on the stove in my new Le Creuset Dutch oven. I'm planning to pair the soup with some pita bread and hummus. My family is coming over for dinner tonight, so we'll see what the soup rating is!

Thanks for stopping by!

Card details:
Cardstock, patterned paper, stamps, impression plate and banner die from PaperTrey Ink; Martha Stewart circle cutter; EK Success circle punch; Memento ink; Copic markers.

My Love Affair With Key Lime

I made a lot of cards this weekend with Key Lime note cards from Memory Box. I made a boxed set of coordinating note cards (birthday, thank you and hello) for my mom for Mother's Day. Since inspiration struck and I had all of the supplies together I decided to get a head start now so I don't go crazy in May! I haven't photographed them yet, but once I have a pic I'll post it. After my note card set was done, I had two cards left in the package and I challenged myself to come up with two more cards so I could throw away the wrapper! Here's my first one:

I stamped the flower image from Hero Arts in white ink and embossed with white embossing powder. Then I applied four different distress inks to the background with foam applicators. I'm really happy with how this card turned out. I guess I'm skipping spring and jumping to summer based on the colors I chose for this card!

Here is my second card:
This one has a similar layout to the first card. I stopped at Michaels yesterday and found the peacock feather stamp and a package of two Smooch Spritz sprays (Citrus Tickle and Splash--love the names!). The colors of the sprays made me think of peacock feathers and I thought it would be fun to use them with the stamp. The card has a lot more sparkle in real life. I thought the sentiment from an older SU! set was a perfect accompaniment.

Thanks for stopping by! Have a good week!

Make It Mondays: Creating With Fun Foam

I'm back with this week's Make It Mondays project, which was to pull out some fun foam from your craft supply and die cut and/or stamp with it. I didn't have any fun foam in my craft arsenal, so I made a special trip to JoAnn's yesterday. I picked out a few spring-like colors with no particular idea in mind and brought them home. The aqua blue made me think of robin's eggs, which made me think of nests, and then my card idea was born. I cut the fun foam with one of my limitless layer dies and used it as a mat for my bird nest image. In keeping with the nature theme, I mounted everything on top of a piece of kraft cardstock that I embossed with the woodgrain impression plate.

Card Details:
Cardstock, stamps, die, impression plate and twine by PTI; Ink by Memento and Color Box; EK Success circle punch; Fun Foam.

PTI Make It Mondays: Adding Glitter With Scor-Tape

I'm back with a card I made for this week's Make It Monday challenge. I've had the Martha Stewart glitter assortment pack for some time now, but I think I might have only used it once. This challenge was the perfect excuse to bring it out of my cabinet! My February PTI release package was delivered earlier this week, and I knew I had to try out the Parisian Lace doily and the Doily Detail dies right away. While I love the end result, it was a big ordeal trying to get those little bits and pieces out of the Parisian doily even with the punch out tool. I had to run it back and forth in my Cuttlebug and Big Shot Express multiple times and then use the punch out tool in between passes. I think I'm going to have to invest in the metal shim to hopefully help the die punch out more cleanly. Still the end result is beautiful, and I don't regret the purchase.

Blue is my favorite color, and I love this combination of Hawaiian Shores and Aqua Mist. The glitter is the Feldspar color.

Thanks for stopping by! Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

PaperTrey February Blog Hop Challenge

Happy Friday! Today is the 25th of the month which means time for another PTI blog hop! This month it was all about scallops. The first card I made for the challenge didn't turn out as great as the idea I had for it in my head (I'm sure we've all experienced that before!) so I tried one more time and just went for the clean and simple look. My goodies from the February release arrived on Wednesday so I was able to play with some of the new products. I also pulled out a stamp set that is old for me but had never seen ink before-Blooming Button Bits.

Thanks for stopping by! Enjoy the rest of the hop!

Card details:
PTI: Royal Velvet and Raspberry Fizz cardstock, stamps, scalloped button die; Neenah Classic Crest white paper; Memento inks in Rose Bud, Grape Jelly and Bamboo Leaves; purple
baker's twine; Glossy Accents; SU! scalloped border punch; Corner Chomper.