Happy Birthday Spring Chicken!

Ahh... It's Thursday.  Just one more day before opening night of hockey and I just can't wait.  This time tomorrow I'll be yelling and cheering and celebrating one of my favorite things about Fall:  the return of hockey!

In the meantime, I continue to make birthday cards using that Simon Says Stamp Birthday Farm Animals set.  Today's card features the chicken (which is so stinking cute).  Once I had it colored, I was back to that same place:  what do I do with it now?  This time I pulled out the tag die from Lawn Fawn from the Winter Gifts set.  It was the perfect frame for the chicken.  I cute a second one from patterned paper from the Pebbles Sunny Side 6x6 pad, which was still sitting on my desk.  Then I cut down another piece using the stitched frame die from Mama Elephants Basic Set and some vellum from the scalloped die from the same set.  Then it was just a matter of layering the papers together, added some Hemptique baker's twine and finishing it off with some Pretty Pink Posh sequins and Glossy Accents on the eyes.  Super cute!

Take Two

Remember this card that I wasn't quite sure about?

Well, I pulled it apart and played with it some more.  I used the dashed line stamp from Lawn Fawn's Winter Gifts to add a little something to the banners.  I used the tag stamp to stamp the tag background to give it more definition.  I pulled apart the baker's twine and substituted one length of Silver Sparkle hemp cord from Lawn Fawn in with the Hemptique baker's twine.  Then I added a few Studio Calico wood veneer stars that I brushed with Wink of Stella and topped with Glossy Accents to give them a bit more flash.  I like it a lot better.  It's certainly not my favorite card I've ever made, but I like it lot better now.

Withholding Judgment

So I'm not so sure about today's card.  I had this idea but it didn't quite translate the way I had it in my mind.  So I'm not in love with this card.  I keep looking at it thinking that it needs something, but I'm not sure just quite what.  So I'm going to sleep on it and take another look at it tomorrow.  In the meantime, what got me started tonight was the newest sketch over at Freshly Made Sketches, another challenge block that I stalk read every week, but haven't participated in for a while.  I really liked Rita's sketch this week and I've had this Happy Trails set from Lawn Fawn that I picked up at CKC about two months ago, but haven't broken out yet.  But now that I've played with the set, I really, really want to go camping, but the RV is in the shop.  Boo.

I had stamped the stars from the Lawn Fawn Lucky Stars set, heat embossed the stars with some Versamark and clear embossing powder, stamped the car and trailer from Lawn Fawn's Happy Trails set, inked the starry night background and grass with some colors of Distress Ink, and had the car and trailer pretty much colored with Copics when my husband came in my craft room.  He immediately commented on how cute it was (which he rarely does when something is in progress).  So I felt like I was on the right track, especially when I added Wink of Stella to the starry night, but it just fell apart after that. I love the starry background embossed with the Darice Stars folder using paper from the Lemon Lush 6x6 pad from Studio Calico.  I wasn't sure on the banners because I couldn't find a paper I liked, so I just colored them with a marker to match.  Basically I like each of the elements by itself, but they just don't really come together right...  So you just may see this card again soon when I figure out what's not quite right.  Do you ever have that happen to you? 

Thinking of You

The inspiration from this card came from a mash-up of two sources:  the card Kristina Werner made with Ferro and some heat embossing on vellum that Nichol Magouirk did in a recent video.  But for my card, I didn't use Ferro this time.  Instead, I used two products that have been sitting in my stash for a couple of weeks from some recent sale shopping I've done:  Claudine Hellmuth Studio Multi-Medium Matte and some Distress Stickles dry glitter.  I used the Heidi Swapp dotted stencil, brushed on a layer of medium, lifted my stencil, cleaned it and sprinkled on the glitter.  Once it dried, I trimmed the piece to fit my card base with a small mat.  Then I stamped the tag from Lawn Fawn's Winter Gifts set with Versamark and heat embossed it with white embossing powder.  Then I added the sentiment from Inkadinkado's Expressions and Frames set following the same method.  To finish it off, I decided on a red poppy when scrolling through my cut files in my Cameo library.  I loved this one and I think it was just the right finishing piece (with a little Wink of Stella in the center of course).

Happy Birthday - Inspired by Kristina Werner

There are a handful of people in the crafting industry that I find seriously inspiring:  Jennifer McGuire for her endless supply of techniques she teaches, Nichol Maguoirk for her amazing use of colored pencils and Gamsol, Vicky Papaioannou for her fabulous art journal pages (and lovely accent), Michelle Short for her clean and simple style (and lovely accent), Catherine Pooler who is a new discovery for me and I'm loving her personality, Ali Edwards for her thoughtfulness, Melissa Stinson who introduced me to Citrus Twist kits (I'm still heartbroken that she's "retiring" because she and Michelle have shown me that one doesn't have to be formally trained and can have a "day job" - or in Michelle's case a day job and school on top of it - and still be quite amazing)...  Oh, I'm sure there a few others that I'll be kicking myself later that I didn't mention, but if I couldn't only see one artist's work for inspiration, it just might have to be Kristina Werner.  I've only been stalking following her for a while now, but I'm constantly amazed by how fabulous her work is both in the products she designs but also in her coloring and finished cards.  They are simply amazing.  I've been so inspired to try to so many of the things she's done (although my budget might squeak a bit at how much I ended up buying because of it). 

For today's card, that's exactly the case.  I saw her use Ferro to make a simple card the other week.  Although I had seen Ferro used before in someone else's video, it was her video that has stuck in my mind.  So when I popped into Runaway Arts and Crafts during my lunch walk last week to get hydro cortisone, I was so excited to see several bottles of Ferro in beautiful colors, but I was drawn to the Steel bottle.  So pretty. 

So, for today's card, I made the background with the Ferro and a simple dotted stencil from Heidi Swapp.  I adore how pretty it is in real life.  For the focal point, I wanted to replicate this cute tag I saw Kelly Marie Alvarez of Lawn Fawn make in a recent release video.  I stamped the tag from Winter Gifts, fussy cut out the inside and then used the Color Box Dahlia Art Screen with some Distress Ink to get the cute petals on the tag.  Then I stamped the tag again, die cut it with the matching dies and glued my "internal" tag portion on top.  I added the Happy Birthday stamp from the Inkadinkado Framed Expressions set stamped in Archival ink over the top then finished it off with pop dots and a scrap of ribbon.

Dream - Still Inspired by Watercolor for Card Makers

Even though the onlinecardclasses.com Watercolor for Card Makers class is officially over today with new content having ended last weekend and the galleries closing tonight, I'm still working through all the fun backgrounds I created and the inspiration just keeps coming.  When Lawn Fawn released their new products at Winter CHA back in January, I just had to have most of them.  There were a couple of sets where I wasn't sure I would get as much use.  One of them was the Dream set.  I could see it really being useful for art journaling or perhaps graduation cards, but since I don't do the first and I don't know many people still in school (and I have at least one graduation set already) I thought I would give it a pass.  But I've seen a couple of cute cards with it lately so it's been rattling around in the back of my mind.  Last week, I took a rare lunch break to walk downtown, oh, not because I really had the time to take a lunch break, but because my legs itched something fierce from this stupid rash that developed after a pedicure and I desperately needed hydro cortisone, so, of course, I had to do a little craft shopping too at Runaway Arts and Crafts since I was already in the area.  I found the Dream set and matching dies and decided that was my call to snap them up.

I have this background I made on the first night of class using the Impression Obsession Circle Fusion background stamp, some Versamark Ink, some clear embossing powder and then some watercolor over the stamped image.  I played around a lot with what to put over it and realized I really didn't want to cover it too much.  I had a Lawn Fawn banner from the Winter Gifts set sitting on desk and I realized it was about the right size for what I wanted.  So I stamped it up, then added some Old Paper Distress Ink to give it a little wear.  For the feathers, I colored them a little with Copics (B95 mostly) and then cut them out.  I added pop dots and some sequins to finish it off.

I'm Back With a Birthday Card Inspired by Julie Davidson...

Life has been crazy and hectic and really I just haven't been myself lately.  But today I had some time in my craft room and I wasn't busy putting together December Daily or Christmas cards or tags for gifts or one of a million things lately that has taken over my life.  But I do have a couple of people with birthdays coming up that I needed cards for my stash is woefully depleted.  So today I made a new card, well actually two of the same card to get me through this card drought.

For this card, I took my inspiration from this card on Julie Davidson's blog.  I used the Lunar Lights set from Lawn Fawn along with the tag die from Winter Gifts (not just for winter at all) to stamp and cut out the focal tag of the card.  I used Versafine Ink in Onyx Black then set it with some clear embossing powder (I am so grateful to finally have a working heat gun again.  Mine died right before Christmas and with my shopping embargo, I was not allowed to buy a new one.  I got one for Christmas but it died the first day.  I'm beginning to think I wasn't supposed to have a heat gun anymore).  I colored the lanterns with Distress Ink and then sprayed them with some water to wash out the color a bit to more closely match the paper I had selected from the Party Day 6x6 pad from Crate Paper.  I fussy cut the lanterns then layered them on my tag and finished off the tag with some Hemptique baker's twine. 

I finished off the card by putting the patterned paper on a mat of solid blue that I had distressed with a little Black Soot Distress Ink and wrapped in the same Hemptique baker's twine.  I added the tag with some pop dots.

I inserted a panel on the inside with a sentiment from Inkadinkado's All Occasions stamp set, also heat embossed to match the front and set on a blue mat inked with a little Black Soot Distress Ink.  I then finished off the entire card with a bit of Wink of Stella on the lanterns and topped with some Glossy Accents.