STAMPlorations october release hop

Welcome to the final day of the STAMPlorations October Release week! Hope you've been checking out the four new stamp sets all week. There's such variety. And humor!

I had some fun with Distress Inks for this release. May I introduce my card using Power of Words.

I couldn't resist a little emboss resist and a galaxy BG when I saw the "to the moon and back" sentiment in Deepti's set. If you want to know more about my galaxy making, check out my Spotlight project post here.

When I'd finished my background I die cut the Crazy Double Stitched Rectangles and before adhering the panel I stamped a couple trio of stars from Balloons and Banners.

With Faith Expressions.

Here I took the stencil Peony Number Two and dabbed pinks and yellows through it. When I removed the stencil, TIP: I went over the white line areas with light pink to soften it all up a bit. Added a sentiment from Shery's set heat embossed with Ranger Liquid Platinum powder. Love that stuff!

Then there's Funny Kinda Love.

Don't ya just love the humorous sentiments? I fell in love with this heart so I ombre-inked some Neenah CS, stamped the image and fussy cut it. Stamped the sentiment on my cardbase and adhered the heart with foam adhesive. Packs a punch in all its simplicity, doesn't it?

And lastly Fairie Door.

Shirley's little fairy just needed a garden so I pulled out Folk Flowers and stamped around a penciled rectangle shape. Then I cut away the inside section. On a panel of Neenah white CS I stamped the fairy and masked her. Then I pounced pink and purple Distress Inks (there's a bokeh-y effect to the BG but it's hard to see here). Removed the mask and gave her a wand and fairy dust. Adhered the inked panel to show through the cut away "garden".

To accentuate the fairy dust, I added some gold Smooch accent ink on the inked panel and continued it onto the card front too. When the clear ink dries, you're left with tiny specks of gold glitter. Nice and fairy-like :)

Be sure to see what the rest of the team made! You'll find links to all our projects here. Prizes? Yep, Check out all the ways you can win them on the STAMPlorations blog. And special for blog followers release week hop participants, until November 1st all orders of at least $12 ship free worldwide with the code OCTSTAMPWEEK.

Thanks for hopping! Have a great day.

it's a purple world

Quick post today. Last day out in the vineyards for me this season. I think and hope. But I managed to make a card for two challenges and want to share it with you.

I used Map Love from Concord and 9th. Stamped the earth in the second lightest Shades of Purple Altenew ink. Heat embossed the sentiment. Then I took a wide flat brush and brushed clean water on the cardbase. This softened up the earth a bit. I smooshed some of the lightest ink onto an acrylic block and picked it up with my brush and dabbed it onto the wet areas. Did this cuz I wanted to join the Watercolor challenge at Where Creativity Meets C9. BTW, the heart was a leftover, cut from Modern Edition Paper Route pack.

And why did I choose purple? Cuz I wanted to join Becca's Hop to Stop (domestic violence, that is) and purple is the color of Domestic Violence Awareness Month.

Hope you have a lovely weekend planned. Stay tuned for the STAMPlorations October release hop later today!

STAMPlorations inspiration #102

Another round of inspiration from the DT today at STAMPlorations, as well as a new release going on. I've used the stamp set being previewed today for today's card.

Kept it very simple. Heat embossed the wonderful framed flowers onto neon pink CS, trimmed it and backed it with a narrow black mat. Stamped the sentiment directly onto my cardbase and voila!

There's so much power in the image heat embossed onto that pink, don't you think?

Thanks for dropping by today. I'm joining the challenges at:
Simon Says Stamp Wednesday challenge - Think Pink
Inkspirational - Black plus one other color

time for a christmas tag

Things have been pretty crazy around here - grape harvest, visitors and such. But it's a rainy day and I'm getting a little crafting in today. I was so inspired by Leigh's tag over at Tag It Challenge #58 that I had to give it a go.

I strayed from the fall feel of Leigh's tag, but kept that wonderful white embossing on the colored CS. And a pop of red! Of course I couldn't not add a red nose to my Rudolph from CUTplorations Christmas Reindeer. The snowflakes are from the coordinating stamp set.

I die cut Crazy Double Running Stitch Rectangle, added a snippet of washi and punched a hole which I threaded baker's twine through. The heat embossed tree and sentiment are from Oh Christmas Tree.

(I actually put a pocket to hold a gift card on the reverse - but forgot to take a photo. Always a good way to get more out of your tags.)

I'm also hooking up at Happy Little Stampers Anything Goes with Dies.

STAMPlorations inspiration #101

Time for more STAMPlorations inspiration on the blog today. I was inspired by this card I saw in blogland. Like, I spent a couple hours catching up on blog visiting and commenting, and after all that time that one card was still stuck in my mind.

So I made this.

I chose to use a Bird of Paradise (cut with the coordinating die) as the B/W image and backed him with a repeat-stamped heat embossed sentiment from the same set. After heat embossing, I masked off a rectangle and applied Peacock Feathers, Tumbled Glass and Twisted Citron Distress Inks. Gave the bird a few colorful feathers and voila!

There's a great array of projects in the Inspiration Post over at STAMPlorations today. Be sure to check them out.

CUTplorations october - reminder

Have you played with us yet in the CUTplorations die cut challenge over at STAMPlorations?

When I made my first card, I had leftovers. Leftovers don't go to waste at my house ;) So this card happened. I disregarded the dark background and went the way of red-yellow-and-green-things-hanging-in-the-air!

I actually saw the strip of red neon paper that I'd cut the word out of for my first card and it was just too cool to pitch. So I plopped one of the leftover Birthday Word into it and built a card around it. I had die cut the hearts while making my first card too, using up the extra space on the paper strips. They reminded me of the heart balloons from Dee's Balloons and Banners, so I pulled that out and did some stamping and then string drawing with a marker. Added a sentiment from Kathryn's Big Wishes and voila!

Wafting balloons like rays of light floating through the air... does it work? Hope I've inspired you to play along with us. If you already have, thanks! Wanna play again?!?!?

I'm playing at Seize the Birthday with this one - it's Anything Goes this time around.

spotlight on the journey from inspiration to card

Curious to hear how I make my way from the initial inspiration to a card? Check out my Spotlight post over at STAMPlorations to see how this card came to be...

p.s. Part of the reason this card "works" is cuz our brains have been programmed through experience to, for example, think "zebra" when we see black and white stripes. If you're interested (and can understand German) this is a really cool segment from a really cool neuroscientist.

STAMPlorations inspiration #100 and giveaway

Welcome to the DT's 100th inspiration post for STAMPlorations! Time flies when you're having fun!

Here's my totally CAS card to welcome a sweet new baby. I've used Tweet Love and a sentiment from Heaven Sent.

Tweet Love

Heaven Sent

Simply stamped the elephant onto a white cardbase and rainbow watercolored it with Worn Lipstick, Squeezed Lemonade and Tumbled Glass Distress Inks!

Be sure to leave some comments on the inspiration posts today - in celebration of our 100th post Shery will be drawing a random winner to win her choice of one of the 4x6" stamp sets used by the DT in today's inspiration post!

wcmd at winnie and walter - part 4

Back with my last Winnie and Walter WCMD challenge entries. If you hadn't noticed, I was VERY inspired by the celebration ;) Today I've two cards.

Taheerah's Pick n Mix challenge helped me on the first one - poppy/lawn/black/white/gold; heat embossing; chalkboard; Christmas. I love creating within restrictions. Without them I've been known to make myself crazy pondering the "perfect" stamp set or PP. Even with them, this particular card stumped me after I'd made my chalkboard. Have a look.

I thought of my cousin's DD and her chalkboard art when I made mine. I wanted the "completely-filled-board" look, so pulled out all the little sentiments from Comfort and Joy and heat embossed them onto the black panel cut with Audrey. Then I heat embossed in green the mistletoe from Elsa's Flora and colored the berries with a white paint pen.  And then I was stuck.

I wanted to work the woodgrain star from Comfort and Joy stamped onto red CS, heat embossed red and fussy cut into my design, so I chose wood PP for my cardbase and decided to die cut Friends from the same PP to tie it all together. Applied Versamark to the bottom half of the die cut and heat embossed it gold for some holiday shine.

My second card was inspired by Kelly's call to Stretch your Stamps. This may not be a big stretch, but I like the impact that tree slice from Winter Wonderland has as a psychedelic BG. Minus the psychedelic colors.

I stamped and masked and stamped the tree slice. Heat embossed a sentiment from Comfort and Joy up top. Swiped some Worn Lipstick and Spun Sugar onto white CS then stamped the poinsettia and leaves. Stamped the berries and colored them black. Fussy cut everything and arranged them onto a circle die cut from gold embossed polka dot vellum.

Got my colors here.

And am joining the new Flower Challenge where it's Anything Goes. Is a poinsettia actually a flower?!?!?

I'm hooking this one up at Shay's Background Building challenge over at WW too!

Thanks for visiting. If you're not playing yet, you can check out all of the WW challenges here. They're open until Oct 9th.

wcmd at winnie and walter - part 3

Back with more Winnie and Walter WCMD challenge fun. DS is going to visit my folks. On his own. Should be interesting. It's been a bit stressful making this happen, but let's hope all goes well...

Conveniently, he's going to be there for their 66th wedding anniversary. Dad's turning 90 and Mom 87 soon. They are still managing their house. And looking out for each other. I know we are so lucky as a family that this is the case. And I've come to realize it's only cuz they're such a good team. (Perhaps that's a natural consequence when only daughter moves across the pond). So I had this idea for a card...

Well, I was thinking of oranges and yellows (cuz they dig 'em) and team stripes or a varsity feel. And then I saw the current Freshly Made Sketch. Bingo.

To follow the sketch I die cut a circle from the panel and then die cut "team" from it using Papertrey Headline alpha die. Adhered the dark circle with foam adhesive so the light gray would show through. Die cut the numbers with MFT High Rise die.

Taheerah's Pick n Mix challenge helped me pull it all together - rust/mustard/gray; die cutting; sequins (those two stars are actually gold and rose gold!); masculine. Whew! I even added a Winnie and Walter sentiment on the front and a Congrats die to the inside.

Wanna know something funny? Those paint chips on the front? I was organizing my folks' basement this summer and found those in Dad's "stuff". Rather than into the bin, they came home with me. They say Dutch Boy on the back and judging by the font I bet they're 20 years old!!! Now they're on their way back to MI!

Probably not exactly what the gals at Stempelkueche were thinking with their "Fall" challenge, but IRL this card has a fall feel with those rust and gold tones so I'm hooking up!

Thanks for looking. If you're not playing yet, you can check out all of the WW challenges here.

CUTplorations October

It's official. Today we begin our new CUTplorations monthly challenge over at STAMPlorations. Makes sense now that Shery has added the whole new line of dies to the store, right? So rather than CASEing designers' cards, from now on the Inspiration DT is going to be playing with die cuts. And we hope you'll join us - our only requirement is that you use die cuts and one STAMPlorations store product on your project. (There's always a free digi here.)

This is our inspiration photo for October.

I was mesmerized by those rays of light and could only think - NEON! (Gotta use up that product stash somehow, right?) Rather than combining it with black, I went with dark gray.

Dry embossed the second largest Crazy Double Stitch Rectangle into my cardbase at a wonky angle. Heat embossed some sentiments from Big Greetings white. Splattered some water and heat embossed those too (heating from the bottom). Die cut Birthday Word three times and stacked them offset before adhering to my card.

The photo gave me a masculine vibe so I tried to keep my card appropriate for a guy, even with those colors. Think it's masculine?

I hope you'll join us for our challenge in its new format. Get out those die cuts and show us your take on the inspiration photo. You can read the challenge guidelines here and find the gallery to link your project here.

STAMPlorations inspiration #99

I was in the mood for a floral card. So I pulled out a favorite technique and a gorgeous little stamp set for today's Inspiration Post over at STAMPlorations.

Here's the set.

Christmas Flower

And the technique is pretty simple. Take a fairly symmetric stamp and use the back and front sides of it to stamp! It's hard to do this card justice in a photo due to the light pink and the shiny Delicata gold...

I used my latest crush - Altenew mini ink pads in Frosted Pink and little touches of Coral Berry in the center - to ink up the reverse of the poinsettia stamp and stamp it randomly on my card front. Then I flipped the stamp over and stamped over the pink solid images with the gold outline image. It doesn't line up perfectly, but that's part of the beauty. I hope you can see it better in this closeup.

A CUTplorations Joyeux Noel cut from gold foil CS finished off this nearly-one-layer card. See what my teamies made this week over at the STAMPlorations blog and don't forget to comment for a chance to win!

wcmd at winnie and walter - part 2 and a winner

Howdy friends! Before I get to my latest cards for the fun happening in honor of WCMD over at Winnie and Walter, I owe you a winner from my giveaway in honor of my 1000th post. The winner of the Essentials by Ellen Thankful stamp set is

Kathy McSeptember 23, 2016 at 5:30 PM

Maria, you nailed several challenges plus reached your 1000 blog posts...all great accomplishments. Love the simplicity and loose arrangement of your card...just my style. So much to be thankful for but at the top of my list after good health are my family, friends and faith.

Congratulations Kathy Mc! Please send me your mailing address in an email.

Now for my cards. I sat down with one stamp set and two cardbases, wanting to play with Shay's Background Building challenge and determined to practice "economies of scale" (yeah, I studied Business) an idea presented wonderfully by this WW Leading Lady.

Same stamp set. Same layout. Two completely different looks. In one short sitting!!!

For my first card I was once again inspired by Heather H.'s Pinspiration challenge.

For my second card I was inspired by blue, green and aqua - Heather P.'s Color Combo challenge.

May I say I'm enamored with this stamp set - Renee's Leaves. It is so perfect. Not too cute. Not too artsy. Just perfect!

I actually made card #2 first, stamping the leaves using the reverse of the stamps, inked with Blueprint Sketch, Shabby Shutters and Cracked Pistachio Distress Inks and spritzed with water before stamping. When it was dry, I came back in with the stamps as they're intended to be used and stamped the outlines with Delicata gold pigment ink. I love this technique with stamps that are nearly symmetric. See the pretty gold on the blue and aqua leaves?

Keeping with the gold theme - I die cut Hello from white and gold and offset the two on my card.

While the colored leaves of card #2 were drying, I stamped the outlines in black for card #1. Then I did some sloppy watercoloring with Squeezed Lemonade and Mustard Seed Distress inks on the leaves with larger open spaces. Left the others white. Gave this card a black Thanks die cut offset on one cut from yellow craft foam and called it a night. Economies of scale, folks ;)

Thanks for looking. If you're not playing yet, you can check out all of the great challenges here.

wcmd at winnie and walter - part 1

I love it when Winnie and Walter have a celebration chock full of challenges! Thanks to WCMD 2016 it's happening again. You can check out all the details here.

I've got three cards for you.

using Kindness and Big, Bold and Friends

 Ultra CAS for Kate's CAS challenge. And colored with rainbow color Sharpies for Gayatri's.

The second card is for Heather H.'s Pinspiration challenge. Here's the photo.

using Sugar Rush

Kept it all B/W by stamping with Versafine black and added some yellow watercolor and splatters and a tiny touch of washi. Those little vines are hidden in Renee's leaves!

My last card for today is for Taheerah's wonderful challenge to Make a Card for a Friend. Maybe you know Jim - Irish Cherokee? He took a horrible fall this summer and this card is on its way to him.

using Scenery: Into the Woods, Tweet and Big, Bold and Friends.

I CASEd a card of Shay's and am joining CASE with Lydia. And the CAS Mix Up for October where it's about "Ghosting". I achieved those ghost images by stamping with water over a distress inked BG. My other technique is no-line watercoloring on the birdie.

Whew! Did you get a chance to make some cards on WCMD? I lucked out that grape harvesting was rained out :) Thanks for coming by.