Happy Birthday Mr C.

It is hubby's birthday and of course I made him a card. He is the reason I am so in love with my pencils (and him too, of course). Since I am usually the one that gets roses throughout the year, I decided he needed some for his birthday and so I colored up this image from Power Poppy's Everything's Rosy Digital Stamp Set.

The window sill

Here I am today with another birthday card, this time using Power Poppy's Go Wild stampset. I stamped the image onto Master's Touch watercolor paper with Memento Tuxedo black ink and colored it with my Prismacolor colored pencils.

First try - Double Embossing

Now that my crafty friend has her Happy Mail, I can share this project. I enjoy watching various crafters on YouTube while I am hand sewing and partial and double embossing were techniques that immediately went on my "to try" list. I think it looks beautiful and elegant.Today was the day I got to try out double embossing.

To start my card I stamped a sunflower from Power Poppy's In Praise of Sunflowers stampset onto Canson Mi Tientes sand colored paper and colored it with my Prismacolor colored pencils. I cut the paper down to the width of the flower and then temporarily taped black cardstock to the edges to make a 4.25 inch wide panel. I then cut the bottom with a shaped edge die.

Then I moved on to the purpose of this exercise. I stamped my sentiment in the corner of a piece of white cardstock. I embossed the cardstock with the Darice Basketweave Background embossing folder using a chipboard shim to prevent the area around the sentiment from being embossed. I followed Nilda Rockenbach's instructions, modifying them to work with my project.

I then embossed with the tag die to create the frame and then assembled the card onto a side folding cardbase. I added three clear gems around the sunflower.

What I learned from this try: I would do the embossing first next time and then the stamping. I think it would be easier to line it all up better that way. Also, I would tape down my die on both sides and not just one as it seemed to have moved while running it through the machine and it is not quite straight anymore.

General supplies:

Sand colored Canson Mi Tientes paper

Reflections 110lb heavyweight cardstock for card base

Black and white cardstock

Power Poppy's In Praise of Sunflowers clear stampset

Stampabilities Everday Expressions stampset

Prismacolor pencils

Memento Tuxedo black ink

Darice Basketweave Background embossing folder

Stitched label die

Gems from stash

Entered into the Fabrika Fantasy Autumn Challenge #24
Entered into the QKR Stampede Challenge #312 - Anything Goes
Entered into the Lil Patch of Crafty Friends Anything Goes Challenge #89
Entered into the Crafting from the Heart Anything Goes Challenge #219
Entered into the Stempelsonne Anything Goes Challenge #205
Entered into the Artistic Inspirations Anything Goes Challenge #206
Entered into the Creative Fusion Arts & Crafts "Sunflowers" Challenge #4

Lots of Flowers!

Oh I am so excited to be able to share some news with you today about a free class over at Kit and Clowder. To celebrate 20k members in the Facebook group, Alyce created a free class for both markers and pencils in collaboration with Power Poppy. Please check out the free class over on the Kit and Clowder website - you will not be sorry!

This is my result of the class. I colored the flowers with my Prismacolor colored pencils. You will learn how to add all this detail in the class and how to make the gerberas pop off the page. I love bright colors and so this kaleidoscope is so inspiring. Once I had completed the flowers, I did the background with a blend of turquoise and blue soft pastels and sealed it with fixative.

I matted the floral image onto a bright yellow cardpanel which I in turn adhered to my cardbase. I cut and stacked three thanks die cuts and coated it with Wink of Stella to add some glimmer.

Note: This endorsement of Kit and Clowder is done of my own volition as I have learned so much from Alyce. I was not asked to do this or was I paid or compensated in any manner.

General supplies:

Strathmore Paint Pad paper

Power Poppy Kindness is the Way digital stamp

Reflections 110lb heavyweight cardstock for card base

Prismacolor pencils

Soft pastels

Krylon Workable Fixative

Black and yellow cardsstock

Wink of Stella

Entered into the Crafts Galore Encore Challenge #54

Entered into the QKR Stampede Challenge #308 - Anything Goes

Entered into the Stempelsonne Anything Goes Challenge #204

Entered into the Kleuren met Potlooden Everything is Allowed August Challenge

A Tie Dye Rose...

It is time for the Power Poppy Challenge again and this month the challenge is to CASE one of the design team members. CASE stands for Copy And Share Everything. But this challenge was to copy only some things and to change some things too. So I visited the various blogs and where do you even start? There are so many beautiful creations. But one just jumped up and screamed ME!

Allison Cope had created a card with a peony that she had colored in tie dye colors on her blog post entitled POWER POPPY: TIE-DYE BLOOMS.

Since I love roses I opted to use the Rose and Chamomile for my project. I created a sentiment above the rose and printed the whole panel out.

I researched the Distress Oxide inks she had used and matched the colors with my Prismacolor colored pencils. This was part of the copy of this challenge.

The card I created was to be for a congregation member moving to a new job out of state and so I made the card 5x7 to allow a large enough space inside for numerous well wishes and autographs. But I like how she had backed hers with kraft paper and so added a kraft panel between the colored panel and the card base.

I love how this turned out - the color combination gives the rose an almost ethereal quality.

General supplies:
Strathmore Paint Pad watercolor paper
Reflections 110lb heavyweight cardstock for card base
Kraft cardstock for middle panel
Power Poppy Rose and Chamomile digital stamp
Prismacolor pencils

Daffodils on a note page

It has been a while since I have been able to share a creation with you. Life interfers with crafting at times as all you crafters out there know. But it was good. I got a special visitor from across the seas and I designed Peter Bear.

I have discovered PowerPoppy as I have told you before and this project is my contribution to the April monthly challenge.

The challenge was to use one of three sketches as inspiration for the project.

I used sketch 2 and used an image from PowerPoppy's Daffodils stampset. I stamped the image onto Strathmore Paint Pad watercolor paper and colored it using my Prismacolor colored pencils. I added the notepad page to a cardbase and then added the colored image which I had cut out with my Silhouette Cameo.

This is to be a card for my mother-in-law for Mother's Day and so I added the word "Mother" to the front using Concord & 9th's Perfectly Penned stampset and added randomly placed hearts with Memento Rose Bud ink. The sentiment is completed on the inside of the card with a personal note.

Since this month's Kit and Clowder Elements of Nature challenge is also Daffodils, I will be entering this project there too.

General supplies:
Strathmore Paint Pad watercolor paper
Cardbase from Paper Studio
White notepad page
Momento Tuxedo Black ink
Momento Rose Bud ink
Concord & 9th Perfcectly Penned stampset
PowerPoppy Daffodils stampset
Prismacolor pencils

Resist technique with embossing power

I have seen many people do the resist technique with clear or white embossing powder and I really wanted to try it out with a flower image. So the other day when I received PowerPoppy's "In Praise of Sunflowers" stampset, I decided that the single sunflower was the perfect image for this experiment.

I used my DIY stamp positioning tool to stamp a letter size page full of flowers. I stamped and embossed and stamped and embossed as it was difficult to see where I had stamped with the clear ink on white cardstock.

Then I cut the page into 4 notecard size panels and did each one a different color combo. I have Momento dye inks in the dew drop size and using my DIY blending sponges, I was fascinated how the flowers popped off the page when I applied the color.

I then cut the panels down with the second size stitched rectangle die from my Gina Marie Design stitched rectangle dies set and applied each to a card base. I added a sentiment to each card by embossing with white powder on black cardstock.

I love the results and will definitely do this again.

These cards were also entered into Day 20 of the Daily Marker 30 Day Coloring Challenge

General supplies:
White cardstock for card panel and cardbase
Black cardstock cut with Silhouette for sentiment
Versamark watermark ink
White embossing powder
PowerPoppy "In Praise of Sunflowers" stamp set
Hero Arts "Acts of Kindness" stamp set
Stampabilities "Card Phrases" stamp set
Momento inks