layered CAS

Howdy. Sharing a "clean and layered" card today I made at DD's request. "For a horsey gal" was the only tip she gave me. Infatuated with The Card Concept's inspiration photo, I did this.

Went with the colors of those peonies, added some gold with the leaves, the gold embossed sentiment and the die cut up top, and brought in the black in the form of the sentiment snippet and those hoof tracks! Not my standard way to make a cool B/W pattern, but I think it works!

Lots of layers here thanks to masking and stamping. Even brought in some stamp kissing (the stripes on the "m") and watercoloring (dabbing at the rose center with a wet brush to soften up the ink).

Have to share this... I was just tickled when I was looking for a scrap for "girl" and found that little one with the portion of a gold heat embossed/watercolored leaf on it. Recognize it (ha ha)? It's a leftover from this card that's literally been collecting dust on my workspace. I think it makes this card with that touch of teal! Well, it and that cool gold leopeard print acetate (new to me).

Supplies:
Stamps - rose (Viva), m (Technique Tuesday), horse hooves (Stabenfeldt), birthday (PTI), girl (Stampendous)
Inks - Spun Sugar, Worn Lipstick and Picked Raspberry Distress Inks, Delicata gold, Memento black
Die - hello (Technique Tuesday), cloud (WPlus9)
Acetate - We R Memory Keepers

I'm playing at:
Penny Black and More - Anything Goes
Craft Stamper - Take it Make it January Anything Goes
Card Mania #88 - Layer it (I've layered mostly stamps, but some snippets too!)
Danipeuss Kartenchallenge #034 alles neu
A Blog Named Hero - January

alice says thank you

A quick post today to share a card I made using the most nondescript stamp in Becca's Strong Women set from STAMPlorations. Remember, Becca's stamp line is 10% off this week. Plus you can use my discount code in the sidebar to get an additional 20% off!

Yesterday's card was one of those "detour" cards - it kinda created itself. Today's happened during the same sitting. All I knew was that I wanted to use the tiny "thank you" sentiment from the set. See it mid-left?

What to do with such a tiny stamp? As I was flipping through my STAMPlorations stash, Alice No. 1 popped out of the bunch (guess it's not in the store anymore!). I purchased this set cuz I love to perch things on things, like uplifted hands. Like a sentiment. Or three in emerald ombre Altenew ink tones.

But Alice is so tiny too. How to get her to the card's "sweet spot"? Enter some metallic embossing paste through Bubbles stencil. And that's my card! Hope you likey.

I'm hooking up at:
Artistic Stamper - Anything Goes
Happy Little Stampers - CAS

spotlight on designing for sketch challenges

Howdy folks! I'm over on the STAMPlorations blog today with a tutorial on my design process for this card, created using the Scrapbook and Cards Today sketch challenge. Hope you'll check it out.

I'm playing at The Heart Desires #8 challenge too. Love these fresh colors in the new year.

And at Happy Little Stampers January Watercolor challenge. No twist.

STAMPlorations inspiration #114

And welcome to Tuesday's inspiration from the STAMPlorations inspiration team! As I mentioned last week, we're tweaking it a bit and each Tuesday post we will all feature stamps from one of our talented stamp designers. And there will be sales ;)

Today we're using Becca's Big Grins stamps. From now until Jan 16 you can get any of Big Grins stamps at 10% off in the STAMPlorations store! Don't forget, with my personal discount code STAMPGIRLMARIA you can earn 20% savings on top!

I must admit I was in a weird mood when I went to my craft room. This card just kinda happened. Not that it happened quickly, but it evolved ;) I used Strong Women.

I started with the stamp set and PP. Had three PP patterns I wanted to use together. Yeah, well, couldn't really make that happen. I chose to die cut (Bloom Happy) a white one too and stamp it with a Bloom Happy frame and Strong Women sentiment. And use only two PP die cuts. Hm. Then what to do with my "flags"? I pulled out Buttercups and Butterflies and a card was born. Landscape? Portrait? Back and forth five times and portrait won. A little bit of machine stitching and my card was done! Whew!

If you liked this one, come back tomorrow for another weird one that kinda created itself...

And if you're interested, here and here are a couple older creations using Strong Women.

So from now until next Tuesday, Becca's Big Grins stamp line is 10% off, Bunnies N Beans is even 20% off. With the STAMPGIRLMARIA discount on top, now is definitely the time to pick up any of Becca's stamps on your wish list, don't you agree?

I'm hooking up at The Artistic Stamper Anything Goes and Happy Little Stampers Anything Goes with Dies.

more ellen hutson mix it up with avery elle

One more card for you mixing product for the Mix It Up challenge over at the Ellen Hutson Classroom. I saw this card design when I was googling Avery Elle Rounded Diamonds and pulled out a marbled piece I'd made with shaving cream and acrylic paint to die cut.

A die cut Many Thanks finished it off. I'm really liking these diamonds now that we've gotten to know each other better ;) Happy Sunday.

ETA: I'm joining the fun at Simon Says Stamp Monday and Work it Wednesday where it's all about "new". My creative session with this die was a first.

ellen hutson mix it up with avery elle

Did you see that the current Mix It Up Challenge over at Ellen Hutson Classroom is mixing Essentials by Ellen with Avery Elle products? I have both. And mojo. Ready?

My first card is for the little girl that received this project. She'll be 8 this year and she is crazy about hedgehogs (must be the German blood in her ;) So of course I had to pull out Avery Elle More Stories, and while I was at it Storybook, cuz I felt some random BG stamping coming on!

Started by stamping the hedgies, then the "8" from Essentials by Ellen Advent, then the bird, and so on to smaller images. I chose my colors from CAS Colours and Sketches #204 and colored some images with Copics.

The number in the inspiration photo over at Double D inspired me to put the "8" on my BG. Happy 1st Blogaversary to Double D! I'm playing at Challenge up your Life too, where it's about DIY Backgrounds. Yep!

Then I worked on a personalized sentiment with some Papertrey products and added a couple vellum die cuts from Essentials by Ellen Wild Garden. And some purple glitter CS (cuz really, when will I ever use if if not on a card for an 8-year-old girly girl!)

Hey, and I even remembered to work on the inside. I think she'll like it.

And then. Know how you just have to have some product, you get it and then you don't use it? That was me and Avery Elle Rounded Diamonds which appear to be discontinued. Love their graphic nature, but daunting. So I went to Color Throwdown #424 and was saved by black!

Somehow when I saw these colors and that image a lightbulb went off in my mind. And this these happened.

I used "enjoy" from Essentials by Ellen Zipper Panel for the sentiment. And pounced my glue pen around the card and sprinkled some chunky gold glitter on it (thanks, Bev) to pick up the gold of the sentiment.

I'm really trying to make multiples each crafting session, ya know? So, the leftovers became a card too. Basically just played around with the pieces until the arrangement felt as right as could be (!) and then added the perfect sentiment from Avery Elle Brushed.

Thanks for sticking with me. One more card coming your way tomorrow. Hope your weekend is going well. It's cold here, like below freezing. But wine drinking outside is still possible if you have one of these fabby fire barrel/table combo thingies to keep your legs toasty!

CUTplorations January

Prosit Neujahr!!

Ready for the first CUTplorations challenge of 2017? Black and gold and gloriously fancy schmancy...

image source: Smashing Magazine

Yeah, I'm a total sucker for that geometric goodness. Add splatters and I'm done!

Here's what I did with die cuts.

Sorry that my black looks like dark blue, but check out that white stuff in the background in the photo below!!! We had a balmy Christmas but got the white stuff to start off 2017. That's cause for a celebration!

My card was pretty simple to make. Heat embossed some images from STAMPlorations Scribbly Splattery Grunge onto my cardbase. Added a strip of washi up top. Then a dry embossed (We R Memory Keepers Gemstone) balloon from Kathryn's Big Wishes with Awesome Word die loosely attached to mimic a balloon string.

I sure hope you'll join us for some die cutting fun this month over at CUTplorations. Just make a project using die cuts based on our inspiration graphic. Be sure to use at least one STAMPlorations product and hook up to the gallery. Winners (there are gift certificates to be had) will be chosen by the DT. Here's the link.

Don't forget about my STAMPlorations discount code in the sidebar if you're in a hurry to get your hands on some new goodies ;)

I'm taking this card over to Danipeuss Kartenchallenge - Feiern, Stempelkueche and Inkspirational. How could I not?