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Challenges

Brushstroke Stamping

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The Penny Black videos showcase not only their stamps and dies, but a variety of techniques. They caused me to get out my watercolors here, and today's card takes me back to the days of woodblock stamps where I used Tombow markers directly on the stamps, then misting them lightly with water to create a watercolor look. I have a couple older Penny Black "slapstick/ Cling" stamps, but this newer one is a much simpler design. 

PBDaisies

The Curvature frames are another of my more recent purchases. This is the middle-sized one and I used the interior, cut from Bristol Smooth paper and put it in my MISTI to stamp. This is a great improvement over the woodblock stamps where restamping was impossible. I used the Tombow markers as well as a waterbrush to even out the stamping and to blend the different colors of ink. I should have done some ink blending before stamping the image, but I didn't think of it, so just added some splatters. My friend, Bonnie, made a beautiful card, and she was able to do the wash after the stamping. I wasn't so brave! 

Nearly all Jill Foster's card bases are the same color as the paper on which she stamps. That makes for a very clean and simple card. I like this particular image much better on a green card base, but I think it's still pretty CAS. 

I'm sending this off to the Penny Black Saturday Challenge--my second entry this month. It's also going to NBUS--another first run for both the stamp and the frame.

PennyBlackChallengeNBUS

Watercoloring with Penny Black

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For months now, I've been watching videos by Jill Foster for Penny Black. Although I had a few products from Penny Black purchased years ago, I've added a few more over that last few months. I've used some of the frames before, but pulled out two  new images for a bit of watercoloring. Jill uses re-inkers for Distress Inks as her watercolors. I have just a few of those, but I have many different watercolor sets to choose from. For these I used both Altenew's 36 pan watercolors as well as a few of the Zig Clean Color brush markers. It had been quite awhile since I had done any watercoloring, and it took a few tries before I got a handle on it again.

SpringFlowers

This card uses one of two images in the Penny Black stamp set, Perch. The title of that set doesn't make much sense for this image, but the second image features a darling bird perched on a flower pot. The beautiful frame is one from the Classy Frames set which I borrowed from a friend. I lightly ink blended the interior die cut before stamping the sentiment from Pinkfresh Studio: You Are My Rainbow. 

The second card uses a set (stamps and die) from Penny Black's new Flower of the Month series. The minute I saw it, I knew I wanted both the hydrangea and the watering can. We have multiple hydrangeas in both our front yard and around our patio. They are among my most favorite flowers. They are beautiful outdoors and last a long time when I bring them in for a flower arrangement. 

Hydrangea

This card design is one of Jill Foster's many designs with both embossing folders and images. This uses Penny Black's Texture embossing folder. I added a thin strip of light gray paper as a border. The sentiment is from Pinkfresh Studio's Extra Special Sentiments.

I'm sending the first card off to the Penny Black Saturday Challenge: Anything Goes, and the second card is off to The Flower Challenge that wants dry or wet embossing. Both will show up on Darnell's NBUS blog since it's the first run for both images, and for the embossing folder as well.

PennyBlackChallenge2025 - 103 June-001NBUS

Happy Father’s Day

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It's frequently a dilemma to know what to design for a Father's Day card. This year I leafed through the Designs category in my stamp collection and came upon an old favorite from Uniko, Bauhaus Blocks. There are five different stamp designs, and when I looked through my Pinterest Board I found this beautifully colored design by Bev Brown, the creator of Uniko Designs. I definitely CASED her color choices, but decided to focus on just this one block.

Father'sDay

After coloring the image I die cut it with a narrow white border, then added a narrow black border with Ellen Hutson's Essential Squares. I used the larger square to cut a window from the front of the card, and then added the design block with dimensional tape to the inside of the card. 

FathersDayClose

The sun is shining and after an extremely hectic and busy week, we're happy to have a day free of any commitments. Matt, Betsy and the girls will stop by later, and we're sure to FaceTime with Sarah and her family, but otherwise it's a low key day. 

This CAS card is off to Addicted to CAS: Water, CAS on Friday: Summer as well as the Four Seasons Challenge–also Summern (Anything Goes.)

Water  June Mood Board

 

 

 

Special Graduation

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Tonight is high school graduation for a very special young lady. I first met Serena when she was in fourth grade when I was volunteering in an after-school program. In sixth grade she received a scholarship for a private girls' school where all her hard work and perseverance paid off. In the fall, she'll be off to Geneseo for college. I'm one of many who are so very proud of all she's accomplished. 

Serena

This is my second graduation card this spring, and both were created using the same products: The Greetery's Yay! suite of products–stamps, stencils, and dies. I chose light blue (the color of the graduates' robes and added the bright pink to create a feminine card with lots of silver glittery accents.

Here's a peek at the inside. The Papertrey Ink, For the Graduate, had the perfect sentiment. I usually take a photo before I sign the card, but this time I forgot. Because I forgot I brightened this photo a bit more since the shadows were getting deep by the time I remembered. 

SerenaInside

I'm sending this to the gallery at Addicted to Stamps and More where the challenge is: Any Occasion.

Addicted

 

Celebrate 3!

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Little by little, I'm finding time to create the cards I liked from the Online Card Class: Celebrate. This one uses a design from Kristina Werner, but has a different different look and feel. Kristina used colored cardstock with a monochrome pattern using stamps. Mine is a white card, and I used the stencils from the class for the pattern. Her sentiment was many colored, and I limited mine to the pink and orange I used for the stencil. She had an additional sentiment. I added some clear pink drops from Pinkfresh Studio. 

Wobbler

The sentiment is attached to the card front with a wobbler. When you touch the sentiment it vibrates back and forth. It's fun, and I tried to capture a video of it, but I needed at least four hands to get it right! Definitely not my forte. Like the pattern, the sentiment was also stenciled as was the "stitched" corners which are from a brand new stencil by Krsitina Werner and Concord & 9th, Finishing Touches. Once I saw her use it during one of the classes, I ordered one myself. I think it will get a lot of use–there are three large stencils with a variety of patterns. 

WobblerClose

This is off to Word Power (where I should have also sent my earlier card!) and to AAA Birthday: No Stamping. Everything here was stenciled. It's also off to NBUS. Even though I did used the sentiment die cut earlier, I've never used the stencils for the sentiment or the patterns. 

Word Power AAA-BD#74NBUS

 

Celebrate 2!

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I have another card to share from the Online Card Class Celebrate! This was a Laura Bassen design which I love, but I have to admit, it didn't come together quickly. First off, it took me forever to find the colors of cardstock I wanted. It ended up that I used cardstock from Concord & 9th, Paper Source, Papertrey Ink, and Gina K. Then I struggled with the wavy dies which required multiple die cuts. But I do love the way it came out.

Celebrate

Kristina did a wonderful job designing the waves from the Sparkle Wave dies. Each one is numbered so you know the order in which to assemble them. My problem was that I misread the 2 and the 5 which looked similar, and I had to recut them more than once to get the color order I wanted. Then although it looks very straight forward, putting the waves together was another issue. I'm pretty sure the next time I create one of these cards it will go much faster. 

CelebrateUp

You can see here that the card front is cut away. That worked wonderfully, and it's a fun element. The sentiment was stamped and die cut from the Celebrate stamp set, and layered four times for dimension. 

CelebrateClose

There are stars and a variety of other shaped dies in the Sparkle Wave Die set, but these stars were already in a little triangle dish on my desk, left-over from this graduation card.  This card is off to Inkspirational where the challenge is Celebrate (perfect!) as well as NBUS.

#celebrate342 NBUS

Color Hues #111

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Sheri is the hostess for the June 1 Color Hues Challenge. She chose Coral and Green:

CH #111 Coral and Green.001

The last time we had coral as one of the challenge colors I spent a lot of time being sure I understood exactly what "coral" looked like. This time I knew which inks and papers would work well, and chose a relatively new stamp and stencil set from The Greetery, Bitty Botanicals. I've always felt a bit challenged by layering stamp sets, but a stamp and stencil pairing was a breeze. The greenery is stamped, and then the flowers are stenciled. Lining them up was easy. 

CH111

I used two hues of coral ink for the flowers: Pinkfresh Studio's Coral Reef and Passion Fruit. Then I die cut the Diamond Ribbon from Concord and 9th's Grapefruit cardstock and added some details with the darker coral ink to the connectors with the accompanying stencil. I love how it all works together so beautifully.

CH111Close

I decided on The Greetery's Nordic Heart die cut for the sentiment, cutting the larger scalloped heart from the Grapefruit cardstock. I was delight to find that the gold embossed sentiment from The Greetery's Bloom and Grow Sentiments fit perfectly on the heart.

For lots more inspiration from our Guest Designer, Barbara, and the Design Team, head over to the Color Hues blog. Then join in, and I'll look for your card in the gallery! 

This is headed for Darnell's NBUS. All the products except for the Nordic Heart are having their debut today!

NBUS

 

Hello, Sunshine!

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Yesterday I had the whole day without any commitments. The sun was shining, and I did take some time to finally sit on the patio with some iced tea. Good thing, the temperature has dropped today, and cooler temperatures and more rain are forecast for the weekend. Tracy's been busy planting in the gardens and the yard in between showers for the last week. He finally got outside for a round of golf with Matt and a friend. I had time to play in the craft room, and in addition to working on some design team projects, I pulled out two new purchases from The Greetery's April release.

HelloSunshine

I'm in love with these products: The Best Bouquet Detail Die, the Sweetest Frame stamp and die as well as the Stitched Scallops. The Stitched Scallops are from an earlier release. I borrowed them from a friend last month and used them on so many different cards, I knew I needed them in my collection. The card design is a CASE of one Betsy Veldman showed during the release. I changed the colors and the placement of the sentiment. I love the yellow and blue flowers! The frame was stamped and embossed in gold, then die cut with the inner frame die. I layered dimensional tape around the edges of the frame and layered it around the floral panel. The flowers and leaves were die cut from colored cardstock scraps with some ink blending. The sentiment is from Spellbinders: Curved Everyday Sentiments which were hot foiled and die cut.

I can't wait to have more time to play with these florals. They were so easy to put together and make quite a statement. 

This card is off to Seize the Birthday for the Use a Frame Challenge.

05-22-UseAFrame

Celebrate!

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Last week I participated in the new Online Card Class, Celebrate. There was a class kit designed by Kristina Werner and Concord & 9th which I received as a birthday gift. Our schedules have been busier than usual, so I still have a lot of cards I want to make. The first cards here are examples of four I created with the same design. Kristina had a brilliant idea for creating a "road map" of the design so it was easy to create multiples. My birthday card stash needed some updating and these were perfect.

HBCandlesX2

The candles and sentiment are both from the Celebrate stamp set. The class cards were stamped on lightly colored cardstock, but I wanted a white background, so I die cut the panel with Gina K's Master Layout #1 and layered it on a brighter card base. The sentiment was embossed in gold, die cut with the matching die and popped up for a bit of dimension.

The next two cards use the same candle stamps, but the candles are die cut and then arranged on the card. I made two cards, using different colors for the background as well as for the candles. 

ForYouCandlesTeal

ForYouBlue

Both of the background panels were dry embossed using one of the stencils from the Celebrate series of products. Laura Bassen taught this class. I don't think I've ever tried to emboss with a stencil, but it worked great and it's a technique I'll use again. It's a bit easier to see in this close-up.

ForYouBlueClose

The sentiment is one of three in the Birthday Script Dies. I die cut it in metallic gold and the shadow in vellum. 

I'm sending these over to Seize the Birthday. The main challenge is to use a frame. I'll be back with one for that tomorrow. These are for the Anything Goes category.

STB-AnythingGoes

 

Positive Vibes

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Crafting has really been a last minute affair since we've been home. We've been so busy, it almost feels like I'm working again. Thanks to friend who gifted me a couple of her sunflowers from Spellbinders, I was able to get a card in the mail for a friend who had a knee replacement on Monday.

Positive Vibes

The card design is thanks for the many videos I've watched in the last few months from Jill Foster for Penny Black. I love this All in One Hexagon frame. I die cut an extra of the interior frames for a little dimension, and added some light ink blending behind the sunflowers.

PositiveVibesClose

The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink's Just Sentiments: Thinking of You.

This seems perfect for the Simon Says Wednesday Challenge: Bright and Cheerful. I'll send it to A Cut Above as well.

Thanks for stopping by. I hope it's sunny where you are. We're in the midst of a cool, gray and wet weather pattern that appears to be hanging on for awhile.

Graduation Wishes

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We’ve been home for week now, and I’m just beginning to feel like I have some control over all the things that need to be done, and all the crafting I want to do. I made time in last week’s insanely busy schedule to pull out my new Greetery Yay! product suite. We attended a party Saturday night to celebrate Betsy’s niece’s graduation with a masters in school counseling from the Simon School at the University of Rochester . The U of R colors are blue and yellow so that took care of any color decisions.

Nadia

After seeing Lea Lawson’s card during the recent release from The Greetery, I used clear embossing ink on the third stencil layer. It’s is a technique I’m sure to use again. Each of the elements work so well together—as they typically do from The Greetery.

NadiaClose

After stenciling the background, I die cut Yay! in gold metallic and layered it for dimension. The sub-sentiment was stamped in the same Pinkfresh Studio blue as the background, die cut and added with dimensional tape. I die cut a few extra stars and added three to finish the card. The card panel was added to the bright blue card base with more dimensional tape.

Thanks for stopping by. I hope your week is off to a good start.

The card is going to the Stencil Fun Challenge where anything goes (not using the optional prompt: bouquets).

STENCIL FUN

Color Hues #110

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I'm the hostess for the mid-May Color Hues Challenge and I chose:

CH #110-Pink and Plum.001

It's important to remember for this challenge that it's a color HUES challenge, and let me tell you, I had no idea how many hues of plum I would find. Here are just three and you can see how different they are.

HuesOfPlum

I wanted something on the pastel end of Plum so went with the Paper Source hue to stencil my Pinkfresh Studio Magnificent Magnolia after embossing it in silver.

I used a soft gray ink for the leaves. I used Altenew's Dotted Scales Debossing Cover Die on white for the background. After stenciling the image and die cutting it, I added it to the background with some dimensional tape.

CH110Flat

The stamped and die cut sentiment is also from the Magnificent Magnolia set. I added some beautiful Iridescent Clear drops from Pinkfresh as the final embellishment.

CH110Close

As always there's lots of inspiration to be found on the Color Hues blog by our Guest Designer, Rachel, and the so-talented Design Team. Please join us in the gallery! 

One of my favorite challenges is the Seize the Birthday Challenge. I ought to have an entry every month (at the very least) but it doesn't always happen. The current challenge is Flowers, and I was glad that I could add this card to their gallery.

05-08-Flowers

 

 

Color Hues #109

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It's May Day. When I first went to school we lived in Hays, Kansas. I remember May Day being a big deal. We made little baskets filled with treats, left them on our friends' front porch, rang the bell, and ran away. I can remember dancing around a May pole at school. Such celebratory events never happened when we lived in Ohio, and I've never seen much of it in New York. Now the first of May represents the likelihood that Spring will come and stay, although there has been snow in May on occasion. It's also the first Color Hues Challenge of the month, and Marcia has chose two springy and happy colors:

Ch #109-Blue and Yellow.001

I reached for one of my new Pinkfresh purchases (I was enabled by a generous gift certificate for Christmas) the Radiating Hearts and Stars stencil and die set. I knew it would be great for two color challenges, and it's a very versatile set–good for almost any age. This time I chose the stars.

CH109

I ran the card front through my die cutting machine with Reverse Confetti's Stitched Rays cover die, and then layered two of the stenciled stars at the meeting point of the rays. I used three Simon Says inks for the stenciling: Marine, Cadette, and Sunshine.

CH109Flat

The sentiment was embossed in gold with Altenew's Sentiment Strips.  I added five sparkly gold stars as an embellishment.

I hope you'll join us at The Color Hues Gallery during the next two weeks, but first check out the amazing inspiration from our Guest Designer, and the Design Team. I'll be away for a good portion of the challenge, but will be checking in as soon as I get home! Have fun!

 

Spring Flowers

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Before we left home for our trip to Europe I was determined to put my new Penny Black Tulip Bloom to use. I'm posting from my brother's in the Hudson Valley tonight. We'll drive to JFK tomorrow to fly to Amsterdam, and my post is just in time to enter the card in The Flower Challenge: Spring Colors which closes in about an hour. It was also inspired by the Double D Challenge: Springtime Flowers. I have some birthday cards to share as well, but I'm not sure I'll get them posted while we're gone. 

Tulip

I kept the design clean and simple, and used another new product, Pinkfresh Studio's Scalloped Grid which I cut down for a smaller panel. The tulip was cut from cardstock scraps and ink blended with some red ink which, sadly, does not show well in the photograph.

TulipClose

The sentiment was foiled in gold with the Pinkfresh Here for You sentiments. 

In addition to The Flower Challenge and the Double D Challenge, I'm sending this off to A Cut Above–it's my last of three entries for April.

2025 - 101 April-001 Double D  CutAbove300

My post for the May 1 Color Hues Challenge is ready to post, so be sure to stop by for that! 

 

Easter Bunnies: Part 2

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Happy Easter if you celebrate! Ours is a quiet one–church and a visit to our granddaughters who arrived home yesterday from a week in Florida. They'll all be tired and getting ready for school to resume, so it will most likely be a quick visit to drop off our Easter cards and a small gift for each of them.

All three cards are the same design, just different colors. I might never have come up with this colorful design had it not been for a comment on my blog from Diane Hover which sent me off to her blog to see her Hey, Honeycomb Bunny from The Greetery. I had kept to more realistic colors for my first two bunnies, but really these colorful bunnies are just perfect for the girls. I chose the honeycomb balls first, then searched through my patterned papers and came upon Sunny Studio's Gingham Jewel Tones which had wonderful matches.

Once I had the colors and the patterned papers all three came together nicely. I die cut the patterned paper with my friend's Stitched Scallops from The Greetery. The Hey, Honeycomb Bunny and all the rest of the dies are from The Greetery as well. The little florals are from the Winter Medley collection, and the little bows were die cut from the Diamond Ribbons die. I didn't bother to stamp and emboss the "directions" for opening the honeycombs since the girls are already familiar with the routine. 

Here they are with the honeycombs closed and then open. Keeping them open is a challenge!

TealBunny

TealBunnyOpen

PinkBunny

PinkBunnyOpen

PurpleBunny

PurpleBunnyOpen

And that's a wrap for Easter this year. I've got several birthday cards to share that also use the Hey, Honeycomb products. They work so well for kids, although I did make one I think will go to an adult. No reason not to spread joy to everyone!

There are still some challenges around where one of these bunnies would fit in the gallery: AAA Colorful with a beautiful colorboard, Shopping Our Stash: Hippity Hop. and A Cut Above where they are always looking for die cut images. 

#15  CutAbove300