Woodgrain Damsel Fly

The latest card challenge on the Cards Blog is to use woodgrain. Oooooooh, I LOVE my Designer Woodgrain background stamp from Hero Arts so I knew I'd be creating a card for this challenge.

I stamped the woodgrain with Chocolate Chip ink onto Close to Cocoa cardstock. Then, I used a Copic marker (E44) to color in some of the grain. I think it gives it a more realistic effect and a ton of dimension. Then, I used a sponge and inked up all around the edges and into the middle. The effect wa a really realistic looking background!! Love it!!!

I decided that this background was masculine looking so I decided to pull out my Pond Life set (Papertrey Ink) and created a great scene using this wonderful damselfly image (dragonflies don't hold their wings up like damselflies do!!). I added some spattered brown ink onto the oval focal point by picking up some brown ink onto a paint brush and flicking it over the image.

I didn't want to cover up all that yummy background so I kept it all pretty clean and simple adding just a bit of hemp and a button.

Supplies: Stamps - Designer Woodgrain (Hero Arts), Pond Life, Mixed Messages (Papertrey Ink); Ink - Chocolate Chip (Stampin' Up!), Spring Rain, Enchanted Evening (Papertrey Ink); Paper - Whisper White, Close to Cocoa (Stampin' Up!); Other - hemp, vintage button (Papertrey Ink), Coluzzle, sponge, paint brush, dimensionals.

Hope you are celebrating today!!!

Thanks for dropping in!

Donelda

Cards Blog Challenge - 8 Colors

So, if you know me at all you will know that I tend to stick to 2 or maybe 3 colors at a time on my cards. So you can imagine my surprise when Paige from Cards Blog wanted us to work with 8 colors .... on one card ... that's right ... 8 different colors!!! My first response was "are you kidding me?" but then I had to take on the challenge.

And this is what I ended up with! I used the skinny stripe in the Faux Ribbon set (Papertrey Ink) and created a 'rainbow' of stripes across the bottom of my white panel. Then I added the tree from Beyond Basic Backgrounds (Papertrey Ink). I wanted to add multi-colored leaves to my tree but I only had purple and blue square rhinstones. But I also had plain rhinstones and Copic markers!!!! I colored a bunch in the other colors to match my stripes!! Love that!!!

A sentiment and some matting and voila, a very colorful card!!! And, to make my week, Paige added my card to her picks on her blog which you can see HERE!! Yeah!!

So, how many colors can you use on one card??!!

Donelda

Cards Blog Challenge - Mini Cards

Well, if you come here often you will know that I love to make mini cards!! Everysize possible! and lately I found a great book on making envelopes with various templates in it! So now I have mini envelopes to go with my many mini cards!!

So, when I saw that the newest challenge on Cards Blog was to do a mini card, I was all in!!

ETA- and my little mini got featured on the bog HERE!! That is always fun!! There were a ton of other awesome minis featured too!!

I created this card first. It is 3" x 2". I used the inspiration photo on Melissa Phillips' Blog as well - love that pink, turquoise and white together - so fresh! I went through my scrap bin to find the bits and pieces and pulled it together. I love the simple white butterfly on top of the bright colored elements. Supplies: small polka dot center from Paper Tray, larger polka dot center from Beautiful Blooms, hi from Wise Owl, and outline circle from Polka Dot Basics (all Papertrey Ink), butterfly punch (Martha Stewart), black pen for the doodling around turquoise oval which was cut by hand.

Next, I created this mini card, also 3" x 2". I've seen THIS stamp used on many cards (like THIS one, and THIS one, and THIS one) - stamped off to the side and embossed. It looks awesome ... but I don't own it. But then I wondered if I could use one of the circle images in the Giga Guide Lines (Papertrey Ink) set and make the same style of card but in a mini version. The silver dots are actually from a package of decals that go on your fingernails. They work great for mini cards and inchies!! Supplies: Stamps - Giga Guide Lines, Mixed Messages (both Papertrey Ink), Paper - Whisper White; Ink - Jet Black (Ranger), Buckaroo Blue and Night of Navy (Stampin' Up!)' Other - clear embossing powder, silver fingernail decals, white twill (Papertrey Ink).

And see that little black envelope beside the blue card!! Wonderful fun thing to make!! The paper is from a 6 1/2" x 4 1/2" paper pack called Power Pallette (Creative Memories) and full of tons of great black and white papers.

I know, I'm supposed to be making wedding invites. but I got bored of doing just that and needed to take a break and get creative!!

Thanks for visiting! I hope you have a great day!!

Donelda

Cards Blog Challenge - Different Shaped Card

Well, I am continuing to try to keep to my New Year's resolutions! I had 3 related to crafting: 1) Participate in more challenges, 2) Use what I have, and 3) make more masculine cards.

Well, this card fits all 3! I made this card for the Cards blog challenge to make a card that is any size but a square or rectangle. I decided to go with a star shape!

First, I stamped this large and small polkadot star on acetate using white StazOn ink.

While my stars dried, I cut the card base out of Kraft cardstock and then cut the main star from a piece of scrap blue paper. I added some faux stitching with my white gel pen around the edge of the blue star. I also created some pattern to the blue paper by clear embossing small stars. I then added the appropriate sentiment using white embossing powder.

When my stars were dry, I cut them out and then added the buttons and hemp to the centers. This allowed me to use a dimensional to pop the stars up as you can see in one of the smaller photos (click on it to get a closer view). You might also be able to see that I sponged a bit of ink around the edge of the Kraft cardstock to give the whole project a bit of dimension.

Supplies: Stamps: Limitless Labels, Everyday Classics (Papertrey Ink); Paper - Kraft (Stampin' Up!), blue (from scrap bin); Ink - Versamark, Antique Linen (Ranger), White (StazOn); Other-white embossing powder, clear embossing powder; buttons (Making Memories), hemp, dimensionals, white gel pen (Signo).

I hope you are having a good and stampy day!! I have been creating all morning and having lots of fun!!

Donelda

Cards Blog Challenge - Squares!

Over on the Cards Blog, the most recent challenge is to use Squares!! I love using squares!! For this card, I pulled out some of the solid shades of BasicGrey papers sitting on my desk (new years resolution - use what I have). The orange = Mandarin Slice from Marrakech, the yellow/green = Citron from Sultry , the blue = Kazoo Blue from Cupcake , and the pink = Fandango from Sultry. I cut each square to 1 and 1/2" square. Then, I stamped various images from the Asian Frames set (Hero Arts) with versamark and then heat embossed them with white. I am particularly

loving that daisy image on the orange square. Next, I adhered them to this piece of kraft colored file folder (good recycling!). I wrote the sentiment with my white gel pen (Signo) an then added the white doodling around the 4 colored squares and also the kraft layer. I placed all of this onto a white card base. Believe it or not, this challenge is actually done in enough time to enter it!! Wow, that's kinda new for me -- LOL!!! Thanks for dropping in to my blog today and checking out all of the cards I've posted today!! Donelda