Card Deconstruction

After getting the photos for my sister, I pulled apart the entire card and played with the pieces to make something totally different.  This card just came together from nothing but I love it.  I started with a Heidi Swapp stencil to add my falling snow.  Before my embossing paste was dry, I added some Judikins Embossing Powder for a little sparkle.  I then added a night sky with about six (!) colors of Distress Ink (Scattered Straw, Seedless Preserves, Faded Jeans, Chipped Sapphire, Tumbled Glass and Black Soot).  I cut out the rolling snow hills with my Mama Elephant Landscape Trio dies.  To the two in white card stock, I added some Versamark Dazzle and the same sparkling embossing powder.  I stamped the sentiment from the Hero Arts set with the houses in some Simon Says Stamp Soft Navy ink and fishtailed the banner.  Love this card, even though it not mass production friendly.

Happy Bird-day Featuring Newton's Nook

I had so much fun playing with my Newton's Nook stamps, that I thought I would keep going.  For today's card, I wanted to play with the Landscape Trio dies from Mama Elephant.  It took me forever to get these dies.  They were always sold out; I mean everywhere!  I've always thought that the scalloped one would work well for surf too so I cut it out a couple of times, inked it up with some Distress Inks and used one of the sloped dies to cut out some more of the DCWV paper for the beach.  On the background panel, I stamped the double bird stamp and colored with copics.  I covered it with a mask and used the negative from the die cuts for the surf to sponge in some background clouds in the sky.  I added a few birds to the background.  I had to cheat for these. I had pulled the bird stamp off the Flirty Flamingos set, but when it came time to stamp I could not find them anywhere!  I'm sure they will turn up when I clean off my craft desk (it's embarrassing to admit this, but this happens all the time).  So I used the birds from Lawn Fawn's Life Is Good set.  I layered everything together and then ran it through my die cut machine using the stitched frame from Mama Elephant's Femme Frames, which I also finally find this week after stalking the various websites for a long time to try to find a place where it, too, wasn't sold out (Ellen Hudson had it in the Basics set).  I then used some cute yellow paper from the Echo Park 6x6 paper pad A Perfect Summer to cut out the larger frame.  I tied some raffia around the beach and then used pop dots to place the panel on the yellow paper and adhered that to the card base.  I added Wink of Stella and Glossy Accents to the flamingos.  I added white Wink of Stella to the "surf" and some clear sequins to finish it off.  Because it's a beach themed card, it fits the challenge over at Newton's Nook to create a beach themed card.  You can find lots of inspiration on their post here.  The challenge is open until August 8th, so go check it out and play along!

Hippo Birdie Two Ewe Revisited...

Since I already had the stamps out on my desk, I decided to make a second card with the Year Four, Critters on the Farm, Hello Sunshine, Technique Tuesday Grid and Jessie's ABC's stamps and dies along with the Mama Elephant Landscape Trio dies.  This time I also pulled out the Stitched Journaling die from Lawn Fawn as well.  I used the same green polka dot paper from DCWV but this time I used a sheet from the 6x6 paper pad from the Maggie Holmes collection for Crate Paper for the sky background and some DCWV polka dot paper left over from a prior project to cover my card.   It turned out so different even though it mostly the same products: 

Hippo Birdie Two Ewe!

Last week was rough.  I got some bad news about a co-worker and it just sort of threw me for a loop because there's nothing I can do to "fix" the situation (I don't like not being in control).  I also realized that the next few weeks are going to a be a bit rough at work so that means I need to really relax during my down time to keep my sanity.  But Saturday I had a headache that didn't seem to want to go away so I curled up in a chair with a kitty and watch crafty videos most of the day.  I know I don't feel well when I don't want to run into my craft room after a few videos.  Fortunately, Sunday I felt a whole lot better (the weather change had completed) and all I wanted to do was play in my craft room.  That means I managed to get a few cards made.

I've been playing with some Lawn Fawn stamps I recently got my hands on, including the oh so cute Year Four set.  I've had this idea for a card using the phrase hippo birdie two ewe, which I often use for birthday greetings when I'm just dropping a quick line to the birthday boy or girl.  I colored the die cut the hippo and bird from the Year Four set and two sheep from the Critters on the Farm set (for which I just finally got the dies - yay! no more fussy cutting). 

I also broke out my Mama Elephant Landscape Trio dies.  I've seen so many crafters using these and I love the cute little stitched elements.  I drug some DCWV polka dotted paper from my scraps bin and sheet of blue graph paper from the Snap Life 6x6 paper pad from Simple Stories for the background.  I found a scrap of yellow paper, stamped it in Simon Says Stamp Lemon Chiffon ink using the Technique Tuesday Grid stamp for a little added interest then cut it out with the die from the Hello Sunshine set from Lawn Fawn.  I used the Jessie's ABCs set from Lawn Fawn to spell out my sentiment.