Happy Birthday Donna

Donna's birthday was last week. We had cake and flowers and of course cards. I made this card to celebrate her special day.

The flower stamp is from Inkadinkdoo that I stamped with Memento Black and coloured with 2 Tria Markers. I added the shadow behind the flowers with Copic Cool Shadow. The sentiment is from a clear Hero Arts set. I'm not sure if you can really see it (I hate scans for poor photos!) but the brown is a new paper to our store. It comes in a variety of colours and adds a beautiful shimmer to any card. Coincidently it is called Shimmer paper. Call us if you are interested. The layers were cut with Label 17, I think.

I didn't get a photo of the inside but I stamped a Whipper Snapper Chicken holding presents that I coloured with my beautiful markers. The base card was stamped repeatedly with Vintage photo and a gift box stamp from Rosewood. I created a pop-card with the chicken stamp that a scan would not have done justice. I was trying for a bit of humour. The outside of the card looked so prim and proper but the inside was meant to be fun. Not at all like Donna herself, she is all fun all the time. One of the kindest people I know.

Clear stamping

I like clear stamps. I like that they are a relatively inexpensive way to purchase a lot of images. I don't like that often they don't stamp well. Below are some images from an Inkadinkadoo set I purchased last week. On the left you can see that the image was "spotty", very frustrating!!! Then I remembered a tip I came across somewhere in my travels across the worldwide web. I took an emery board (with 3 teenage daughters there are a few around!) and gently rubbed the image. As you can see from the image on the right the quality of the stamped image was improved greatly. I coloured the image on the right with my lovely copics, a quick hit of colour that I intend to enamel and do something with....

July Challenge Cards - continued

Lauralee's card is understated elegance. The grass stamp is from Hero Arts stamped and embossed with Tim Holtz distress inks and clear embossing powder. The decorative border is handmade paper distressed and inked with Peeled Paint. The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink. Lauralee uses a distresser on many of her cards and she put it to good use on this one. All of the elements have been distressed. She also often uses a corner rounder on her cards. So cute and something I hadn't thought of doing until I saw her cards.

As I have said before, I love Penny Black!!! For this card I dug through my stacks of designer paper to find colours that would coordinate. The decorative element is hand made paper cut with the decal edge blade on my paper cutter. The stamped image is coloured with copics. I think the sentiment is from a clear Hero Arts set. Wow now that I see the picture of my card I can see just how crooked I set the elements down. Not my strong suit, that is something I will have to take more care in finishing!

Cassie used Nestibility Large Label to create her layering pieces from designer paper. The flower stamp is from Technique Tuesday with a black gem added to the center. Cassie originally had a sentiment in the upper left hand corner but wasn't thrilled with the look. She decided to stamp a second outline flower from the same set. She added dollar store paper flower and another gem to finish. The sentiment is from a Hero Arts set.



Jacqui is our resident non-card maker. Very difficult to tell from the cards she has been making. Barb tells us she makes beautiful cards and then throws them out because she doesn't like them. She water coloured this wonderful Penny Black stamp and layered to her hearts content. The butterfly in the upper left is from Rosewood and I have misplaced my notes, so I don't know who the sentiment is from. Jacqui should be proud of this card. It is so gorgeous.

May Challenge Cards

Our May Challenge was given to us by Lauralee, seen here. The twist with this challenge was to create a tone on tone card.

Barb used her Cricuit to cut the flourishes. She used Cuttlebug Flourished Frame to make her central frame. Her sentiment is stamped and embossed on vellum then centered in the frame. A coordinating ribbon added the finishing touch.



I don't own a Cricuit but Barb, Jacqui & Darlene do. Barb used a Cricuit cartridge to create a spectacular envelope to match her card. Who wouldn't want to receive this set in the mail? Maybe I will have to ask for one for Christmas....hint, hint



Donna really outdid herself with Lauralee's May Challenge. She created this incredibly beautiful card using only black cardstock. She used a flourish folder to mimick the design challenge Lauralee gave us to work with. Layered Nestibility label to create a striking design element.



Darlene used gorgeous blues to create her card. All of the sparkle on Darlene's card comes from Cobalt Tapestry Embossing Powder. She used it on the Spiral Frame that is stamped top and bottom and she used it to edge the ovals. Sorry Darlene didn't identify the makers of the stamps she used.



Cassie made the reds sing in her cards. She used Inkadinkadoo Floral Flourishes embossed with Red Sparkle to create her flourish element. She punched layered ovals and added a Tim Holtz diecut bird from his new set Caged Bird. Not a complicated card but very effective


Tomorrow I will add the rest of the challenge cards, including this month swap mistress' work who is such an overachiever. Kidding Lauralee, just kidding.

March Card Challenge

I chose this sketch for our March card challenge and as I said in my previous post, Donna & I found it more challenging than we thought it would be to follow a sketch.



Cassie joined our card challenge this month and her card used some beautiful paper that has a hand-made look. A Nestibility die was used for the layered medallion. She added a bit of bright ribbon, dollar store paper flowers and a gem to finish her card. Cassie did realize she had cut her smaller squares a bit too small and remade her card but gave it away before I could get a copy.



Donna's card features a cute stamped puppy from Inkadinkadoo. The puppy is layered onto Nestibility frames. She then added a beautiful ribbon and some doggie themed brads to complete the layout.




I tried hard to avoid the black & white featured in the sketch but in the end just couldn't resist. There is a sentiment stamped on the Nestibility frame but it is simply the wrong colour and I will restamp in a darker colour. I added some dollar store paper flowers with gem centres and a piece of ribbon.



Darlene used her Fiskars Shapeboss to add dimension to her card. The flowers and film strip are dry embossed and glittered. She used her Cricuit to cut the tag and stamped the lady on the tag. Darlene chose to round the corners of her upper squares and managed to create a perfect copy of the sketch in an A2 size. On the inside of the card she has stamped "Out of the way of a woman working." and unfortunately I don't know who makes that stamp.



And once again Lauri has created a stunning card. Lauri has used inks from Stampin' Up to create a perfectly coordinated card. The grass stamp is from Stampin' Up and she didn't mention where the sentiment stamp is from. The sentiment is layered onto blue cardstock, roughed up with a distressing tool and the edges softened with dark blue ink. Lauri created a large stamped image that she cut to replicated the sketch.





Darlene has chosen this month's challenge. Since she enjoyed the sketch challenge we will be making our cards based on this sketch for April.