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Woodblock Wednesday

No, it is not Wednesday, so this is a day late, but still in time to post on Amy’s blog.

Somehow I’ve never gotten back on track since we’ve returned from our trip. The days fly by, and most of the creating I’ve done has been for my Design Team commitments. There have been frequent, and fun, social engagements, time to watch grandchildren compete in a field hockey tournament, and more than the usual reading required for the three book groups I participate in. Much to my dismay, one of the groups changed the book for the May read from one I had already read to one that had 480 pages! It was The Searcher by Tana French, and I have to admit it was a good read. Nonetheless, yesterday I discovered that I had missed Woodblock Wednesday, so the first project today was to catch up with that.

The two stamps by Annette Watkins were right on top of the drawer I looked in, and I didn’t hesitate to pull them out knowing they’d make an easy CAS card. They’ve long been favorites of mine. I colored the flowers and foliage with Copic markers.

The sentiment stamp is perfect for a Thinking of You card which I need way more frequently than I wish. Luckily, since I was in a hurry, both stamps stamped perfectly the first time.

Hop over to Amy’s blog to see a selection of fun cards created with wooden stamps!

Flower-Filled Watering Can

It’s my day on the Memory Box blog. I love the Rustic Watering Can die. It’s the perfect size to hold a flower arrangement.

I die cut and assembled a LOT of flowers and foliage from the Arched Flower Basker recently, and chose primarily yellow and orange ones for this bouquet. The watering can was die cut from gray cardstock. I added a little darker ink blending to add some interest and dimension. After creating a card base from white woodgrain cardstock, I die cut a slightly smaller panel with the Heritage Rectangle Frame die and layered it on the card base. Once the watering can was added to the panel, I spent some time arranging the foliage and flowers in the can, tucking some behind others and some peeking out from the top of the watering can.


I chose one of the White Gold Foiled Greeting Tags for the sentiment, adding two tiny flowers as embellishment.

I’m sending this off to AAA Birthday Challenge where they’re celebrating their 6th birthday with an Anything Goes Challenge and to Darnell’s NBUS. The watering can is making its debut.

Two Clean and Simple Cards for Memory Box

It’s been a wild week, and although I’ve been busy at the crafting table in between commitments (of which there were far too many), I haven’t had a chance to photograph or edit most of them. These two cards went up on the Memory Box Blog on Wednesday. Last year I received a wonderful birthday card which I saved for inspiration. These cards are a close CASE of that card.

I loved the design and decided that one of the many florals in the Arched Flower Basket die would work perfectly for it. I love that just one small die from a large set can be inspiring on its own.

I created the card with yellow flowers first, and then made a smaller version with vellum flowers like the ones on the card I received. 


Both card bases were created with Fresh Snow Linen cardstock from Papertrey Ink. The first one is 5 1/2 X % 1/2 inches with a 5 X 5 panel layered on top with dimensional tape. The flowers were die cut from yellow cardstock in the Sunrise Paper Pack with gold mirror centers. Once the flowers were assembled, I arranged them on the panel, and glued a piece of white cord behind each flower. I tucked the ends under the panel and adhered the panel to the card base. For this card I stamped a small greeting with the Sunshine and Wildflowers stamp set on a strip of cardstock attached with dimensional tape.


I followed the same steps to create the smaller card, creating a 5” x5” card base and a 4 1/4” X 4 1/4” panel. I had a piece of lovely purple vellum in my stash and used that for the florals for the Arched Flower Basket and added Clear Fairy Drops for the centers. I chose one of the Happy Birthday Foil Greetings Black Tabs for this sentiment.


The weather has been less than ideal for Memorial Day. Yesterday it poured and the wind took down trees and power lines–luckily not on our street. There’s been no rain today, but it’s still way too chilly for the end of May and the sun is still hiding out elsewhere. The good news is I’ve gotten a lot done inside!

Color Hues #133


Tracey is our hostess for the mid-May Color Hues Challenge, and she chose a color combo just perfect for my new Spellbinder’s pansy dies.


Spellbinder’s Pansy Seed Co. was April’s Small Die of the Month selection. I’m not a long-term member of the Spellbinder Clubs, but occasionally I join in order to get a die I want. That was true in March (that die is being saved for a granddaughter’s birthday in the fall,) so I was already a member and loved the pansies.

Spellbinder’s Pansy Seed Co. was April’s Small Die of the Month selection. I’m not a long-term member of the Spellbinder Clubs, but occasionally I join in order to get a die I want. That was true in March (that die is being saved for a granddaughter’s birthday in the fall) so I was already a member and loved the pansies.


I die cut all the pieces for the pansies and leaves from Bristol cardstock and ink blended them with finger daubers. Once they were assembled, I went looking for a container and came upon The Greetery’s Seagrass Basket. It was die cut from Papertrey Ink’s Weathervane and Dark Chocolate cardstocks. I added tiny little metal brads to attach the handle after weaving the pieces of the basket together. 


Altenew’s Organic Linen 3-D Embossing Folder was lying on my table. It, too, is a new product and hadn’t even been put away, so I ran a piece of Simon Says Slate cardstock through it and attached it to a card base of the same color. After adding the basket to the card front, I arranged the pansies and leaves. The sentiment, from Pinkfresh Studio’s Beyond Happy, is gold embossed to pick up on the gold paper I used for the center of the pansies. I die cut two extras and layered them to give the sentiment a bit of dimension.

This is such a fun color combo, I hope you’ll join us in the gallery. It’s open until May 29th at 9:00 am so you have lots of time! If you’re looking for inspiration, check out the wonderful cards by the Design Team,

I’m sending this one to three challenges: The Four Seasons Challenge: Spring–pansies are one flower that can withstand our fluctuating temperatures, A Cut Above (Anything Goes for die cuts) and NBUS since the Pansy Seed Co. is new to me.

Just a Note

I’m up on the Memory Box blog today with a card featuring three of the new products from the Sunkissed Summer release. It has been awhile since I did any watercoloring so I pulled out my Kuretake Gansai Tambi watercolors to create this card.


I die cut the Wild Leaves and one of the Brilliant Butterflies from watercolor paper as well as a background panel. I used three different greens, mixing some together to watercolor the leaves, letting them dry between applications of the watercolor. For the background panel, I used a large brush to watercolor the whole piece in blue. Once it dried I die cut it with new Cinched Frames. The butterfly was last. I used some of the same blue as the background and added a violet to the edges of its wings.

This is off to the Double D Challenge where they want watercolor, and to Darnell’s NBUS–all these products have just been released.

It’s lovely to have some new products to work with, but the name of the release, Sunkissed Summer, is certainly a misnomer here. We’re definitely not close to summertime weather yet. The temps go up and down, but generally is just cool and, too frequently, wet and chilly. It looks like it will improve early next week. The test will be if it can maintain the warm temperatures! We’re off to buy some flowers at our favorite Amish nursery on Friday. I want to be able to put them outside without any fear of frost.

Happy Mother’s Day


It’s Mother’s Day and I have a card to share. Actually, there are two versions of this card. In the other version, the “Silly Goose” is headed in the opposite direction. My card is a very scaled-back CASE of a fabulous card by Kelly Lunceford. I adore these wonderful Silly Goose dies from The Greetery, and I thought they’d make fun cards for my daughter-in-law and her sister. We’ll all be together for brunch later this morning. 


For the background, I die cut an arch from gingham patterned paper and added it to a white card base. The Garden Gateway die was cut from woodgrain paper, and ink blended to add some detail and dimension. I’ve had this die in my collection for well over a year, and this is the first time I’ve used it. After adding it to the arched background, I die cut almost all of the pieces for the goose and the florals from white cardstock and colored them with finger daubers and a variety of inks. Her hat, the ribbon, and the flowers on the hat were die cut from colored cardstock scraps. 



The florals are both from The Greenery’s latest release: Bigger Botanicals: Jacob’s Ladder and Bigger Botanicals: Oregano. Once everything was assembled, I added the florals to the front of the gate, and finally, the Silly Goose with some dimensional tape. The sentiment is from the Silly Goose Sentiments stamp set and die cut with the coordinating die.

My daughter, Sarah, is getting a Jacquie Lawson animated Mother’s Day card. I didn’t decide to make Mother’s Day cards in time to get one to Wisconsin before today. Tracy and I did find a fun card that showcases paper crafting. Sarah doesn’t indulge in card making but she creates amazing gifts and works of art with her Cricket machine. I think she’ll like the card, and Hannah is sure to be a fan. I gave Hannah some card making supplies two years ago, and she make many cards for her friends and family.

This card is off to Darnell’s NBUS blog to celebrate finally breaking out the Garden Gateway die.

Gifts Galore

I was on the Memory Box Blog yesterday with a festive birthday card using the Gifts Galore die cut set. I’ve used some pieces of the Gifts Galore die before, but haven’t created a card specifically for them. To start, I die cut all the pieces from white cardstock and colored them with Copic markers before assembling them.

Once that was done, I die cut two circles from the Round Eyelet Circle Frames and layered them on top of one another with some dimensional tape. I created the square cardbase and then added layer of bright green and yellow to the white card. The I spent some time arranging the gifts. Once I was happy with it, I laid a piece of Press n’ Seal over them and flipped it over to add glue to the backs of the gifts. That makes laying them down on the white frames easy peasy.


Finally, I added one of the Happy Birthday White Foil Tabs from Memory Box across the bottom of the circle with dimensional tape. 

I’m sending this off to the AAA Birthday Challenge where they’re celebrating seven years of creating fun challenges for card makers. It’s also off to the Wednesday Simon Says Challenge (they’re looking for Colorful.)

Just a Note


We’ve been home for just three days from a fabulous trip to Croatia and Slovenia. I have photos to share later, but I want to send this card off to Just Us Girls Challenge where Carol is hosting the current challenge: CASE a DT.


Carol is a wonderfully creative card maker, and the minute I saw her card, I knew exactly what I wanted to make. Here’s Carol’s beautiful card:

And here’s my take:


Like Carol’s, the background for my card is a piece of patterned paper. It’s from an old favorite 6X6 pack by Sunny Studio. I die cut the Spiral Notebook by Papertrey Ink from Fresh Snow Linen cardstock that reminds me of the texture of some expensive stationery. I added it to the background at the same angle as Carol’s postage stamp design.


The pen from The Greetery’s Pen Pal die was also cut from a scrap of patterned paper (unknown) with silver mirror cardstock for the nib and pen accents. Rather than stamp my sentiment as Carol did, I added a die cut from The Greetery’s Scripted Sentiments. The pen was added to the card with some thin dimensional tape.

It’s good to be back in the craft room again, and to have some time to create just for fun! I have 16 birthdays and anniversaries on the May calendar. Fortunately, many of the cards I need were created before we left, but I’ve been busy trying to get the rest of them done.

Color Hues #132

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It’s May 1st, and I’m always glad to see this turn of the calendar. In western New York, you can be pretty sure Spring will finally make an appearance and stay put. Stef has chosen a very springy color combination for our new Color Hues Challenge: Yellow and Blue.


While I was hunting for an embossing folder to use on another card, I came across the Altenew 3D Embossing Folder, Fragrant Florals. It’s been awhile since I stenciled an embossed design. I’m happy with the end result, but it was a bit more involved than I anticipated. Because I wanted two colors, it was necessary to do a lot of masking. This card represents the third attempt to get a clean result. I added some white gel pen to the floral centers to make them stand out a bit.


I pulled out two shades of blue, yellow and gray inks to color and shade the florals and leaves. I cut down the embossed panel in order to have a narrow mid-gray frame on a dark gray card base. The sentiment is gold foiled with Spellbinder’s You Are Everything Sentiments which fit in perfectly with the florals. I added a few gold pearls as a final accent.


Please hop over to the Color Hues Blog to see the variety of cards by my very talented teammates, and our Guest Designer, Greta! Then I hope you’ll head for your crafting table, and add a card to our gallery.

Color Hues 131

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Sheri is the hostess for the mid-April Color Hues Challenge and she’s chosen Coral and Green.

The first time coral appeared in one of our challenges, I had to do some research and some hunting through my supplies to find papers and inks that are coral. This time I had no hesitation, and I actually started with the design of the card in mind before choosing the stamp set.

It’s been awhile since I used Pinkfresh Studio’s Darling Dahlias stamp set, but it worked perfectly. I used the stencils to color it with a combination of Pinkfresh and Papertrey Ink inks. I tend to have a heavy had when it comes to ink blending, but have discovered that using the large Pinkfresh Studio blending brushes and standing up while applying the ink made it much easier to get the look I wanted. 


After cutting the coral cardstock panels with two sizes of Ellen Hutson’s Essential Rectangles, I die cut an oval from the same series in the middle of the smaller panel. I adhered the stamped piece behind the oval opening.  The dies in these sets cut the shape as well as a narrow frame. I die cut two so I could glue two frames together to provide a bit of dimension. That panel was added to the card base with dimensional foam. Finally, I added a gold foiled sentiment from Spellbinder’s Curved Everyday Greetings. 


I hope you’ll join us in the gallery for this pretty color combination. Be sure to check the Color Hues Blog for lots of inspiration from our Guest Designer, Kelly, and the always creative Design Team.

Guest Designer for Time Out Challenge

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Thanks to a win in February, I’m delighted to be the Guest Designer for the new Time Out Challenge: Pick Two. It’s interesting that the challenge I won was also a Pick Two. 


My card uses just two of the prompts: pastel and bloom. I was hoping to add a sentiment for hope, but I don’t have many and the ones I had were too large for the design of my card.


I started with a silver hot foiled image from Pinkfresh Studio, Folk Floral Stem. Although it’s long been a favorite, I haven’t used it in quite a while. There are two stencils for both the florals and the leaves. The second stencil for the florals was too stark for what I wanted so I added the pale pink to the bottom of the yellow florals to create some soft blending. It’s harder to see on the pink portion of the main floral but I did add more pink to the bottom of that as well. It does show up a bit better IRL. I used both of the stencils for the leaves, but tried to use a very light hand with the darker green ink. 

Once the floral was colored, I did cut it with the accompanying die. To create the white-on-white background. I ran a panel of white paper through the die cutter with the Penny Black, Texture, embossing folder. I cut that down to fit behind two of the Penny Black Elegant Frames that I glued together. I added the frame to the card front, then tucked the floral design in on top, adding dimensional tape under parts of the floral. I didn’t want to cover the design so found a simple sentiment in The Greetery’s All Occasion Script Sentiments. I embossed it in silver and die cut it. I love the script font, and it fits in beautifully with the curve of the floral design. The final touch was to add a few Pinkfresh Clear Iridescent Drops which add a bit of sparkle.

Many thanks to the Design Team at Time Out for the opportunity to play along with them for this challenge. 

Shaped Poppies Card

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I’m here to share a new card that went up on the Memory Box Blog this morning. Red poppies are my favorites, and I’ve been meaning to get back to the delightful Playful Poppies stamp set. This stamp is large enough for a 5X7 card, but I wanted one that was A2. 


I stamped the image with Copic friendly ink on white cardstock and then placed one of the Nested Globes over the design to decide which part of the design I wanted to highlight. I die cut it before I colored it with Copic markers. It’s been awhile since I did any Copic coloring, so this was lots of fun.


To createdthe card base, I die cut two of the next largest Nested Globes from black cardstock. On one piece I scored about 1/2 inch from the top and folded it back. I applied glue above the fold, and added the other piece to the front. 


I attached the poppy panel to the front of the card base, and added a Black Tab Birthday sentiment. I decided to keep this very Clean and Simple, so didn’t add any embellishments. 

I’m sending this off to Seize the Birthday: Spring Garden, my second entry this round.

Happy Birthday, Adam

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Today is my son-in-law’s birthday. I started his card with a bold birthday greeting die from The Greetery, appropriately named Make a Wish. I die cut the greeting in white and the shadow in black. Then I added two more layers of the shadow to give it some dimension.

The background panel was foiled in matte black foil with Pinkfresh Studio’s Stippled Plaid Press Plate. The foiling is quite subtle, but lovely, and doesn’t show up in the photo. I trimmed it down and then added it to a black card base before adding the sentiment with foam dots.

This is my second entry to the As You See It Challenge asking what cards, beside Christmas, do you make the most often. Hands down, it’s birthday cards.

A Pocket Full of Poseys

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I’m back on the Memory Box blog with another card using the wonderful floral die cuts from the Woven Flower Basket. This time I created a card with a faux pocket and arranged the flowers at the top edge of the pocket.


The first step was to die cut the flowers from papers in the Lagoon, Blush, Greenery, and Sunrise paper packs. Next I die cut the largest of the Round Eyelet Circle Frames from white cardstock followed by a circle from the Basic Circles Dies just a bit smaller than the Eyelet Frame. I die cut the plain circle with the Pinpoint Flower Plate and cut it to a little more than half to create a pretty pocket which I attached to the Eyelet Frame.


I arranged the flowers and leave on the pocket, some with dimensional tape, and attached one of the cute gold embossed Happy Birthday Greeting Tags, also with some dimensional tape. 

I’m sending this off to the As You See It Challenge where you fill in the blank:

I definitely mail birthday cards more than any other! In fact, I’ll be mailing 14 birthday cards in the month of May! I’m also sending it off to Seize the Birthday: Spring Garden.

Spring Flower Basket

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This is a card I created for Memory Box awhile ago, but was just posted yesterday. The Flower Basket Bouquet from the Spring Blossom release, is sure to get a lot of use. I stuck very close to the design on the product envelope but earlier I used just the tulips to make a simple bouquet and have used a few of the flowers on other projects. So many possibilities, especially when combined with the Woven Basket die from the recent Birthday Blossoms release. 

I die cut the basket from light gray cardstock, and added some ink blending to give it some dimension. I die cut the backing to the basket with dark gray cardstock. 

All the flowers and leaves with die cut with scraps of cardstock in my stash—many of them from Memory Box paper packs: Blush, Lagoon, Sunrise and Greenery. I added a bit of ink blending to some of them, and used a Sakura Black Glaze pen to add centers to the small white flowers. 


The largest of the Oval Eyelet Rectangle Frames was die cut from dark gray cardstock and then adhered to a light gray card base. I attached the basket to the background with dimensional tape which makes it easier to arrange the flowers. I also added some bits of dimensional tape to some of the flowers. The final touch was to add a few clear Fairy Drops.  

I deliberately left off a sentiment. It will be easy to add a little tag for a birthday or thinking of you card when I need it.

Spring is definitely on its way despite nearly freezing temperatures the last couple of night. The forsythia is beginning to bloom, the daffodils are blooming, and there are more warm, sunny days. It will continue to be a roller coaster of temps until May, but the light is beginning to appear!