Smooch, Goosebumps and Halloween

Kind of eclectic title, but describes the cards I have to show you today. 

I used smooch on this card;  I put about an inch of water in a pie plate and dropped a few globs of the smooch colors into the water and used a toothpick to swirl them.  Then I put the paper in the water pushed it under and then took it out.  I love the marbled effect and each piece of paper I did was different.  It is hard to see in the photo, but there is also some light pink Smooch.  I also put the white flowers into the water - the jewels are already attached, I just wiped them off.  The paper flowers come from a punch.  Simple yet beautiful!

This card uses the new Goosebumps spray by Tsukineko.  I stamped the flowers with  Adirondack Watermelon then sprayed on the Goosebumps, when dry I rubbed it all over with more Watermelon and wiped it off - the spray is used like a resist.  The depth it gives to the card is wonderful.  I cut out another flower and popped it on the top left.

On to the Halloween part!  Making cards for Operation Write Home requires you to look at the calendar a little differently.  Halloween is due to the shipper's mid September; Thanksgiving the end of September and Christmas by Halloween.  In December I'll work on my Valentine's cards due by 12/31.  So, last week we topped out the weather at 100 degrees and the humidity made it very difficult to breathe due to asthma, so I stayed inside with my air conditioners!  I haven't started on the Christmas cards yet, but that's next after I get this box shipped out.

These last 2 cards have nothing to do with any of the above except I was using up more scraps.  I used a new 2 me embossing powder, Judikins Diamond Sparkles, on the butterfly and it is gorgeous.

So, I'll see you Friday with the next PaperCutz Challenge, until then keep cool and be creative!

New page and more cards

Well, going back to work really put a damper in my crafting! However, it pays for my supplies, so I guess it all evens out. Cheryl of Inspired Designs asked me to make a sample layout using a product she has from piggy tales called sliding doors. It is at the bottom of the layout with a quote and a picture of my daughter. The quote is glued to the sliding door, when you move it over there is a space underneath for journaling or another picture. I put another picture of Toni there. I sprayed the white chipboard piece with Glimmer Mist - it gave it a cool mottled look; I also sprayed the various chipboard flowers with the same color, but some of the flowers were gray and they came out darker. This is the first time I have used paint on a layout - I just put a swoosh across the top for my title, but I really like the effect. The paper is Starry Night by Sassafrass Lass.

I've also been busy making some card samples for Cheryl's store. Actually, I've really been busy playing with my new line of inks. I just got the Adirondack inks in the bright and earth tone lines and they are fabulous! The ink seems to "move" really well so I went wild one night and did up a bunch of coffee filters in a tye dye effect - it is the background and flowers on the card. After die cutting the flowers I ran them through my Big Shot in an embossing folder to give them a little more dimension. My favorite colors are the Wild Plum in earth tones and Purple Twilight in the brights. I'll post a sample using the brights soon.




I've also been playing with texture plates lately. I have some from Sizzix as well as Fiskars brand. This card is made using a Fiskars plate I ran through my Big Shot. The Fiskars were designed to be embossed by hand, but they do beautifully in the machine! For this card, I inked the positive and negative sides and they both made such a good look I decided to put them together. The stamp is Michael Strong (I love his stamps and seem to use this one in particular a lot). I rarely make monochramatic cards, but even I think it came out great!








My last card tonight is a quick and simple photo card. The picture is a close up of a bouquet of flowers I was given. I cut the picture into 4 strips and mounted them on pink cardstock. The "ribbon" is actually green cardstock run through an embossing folder and the medallion is a Sizzix embossing folder. The colors are much more striking in person.


That's it for now, thanks for stopping by and I'd love to hear from you!

4th of July and Cuttlebug Asian Folders

I seem to be doing posts in two's, but that's ok; it's either feast or famine for me, I guess.

Happy 4th of July to everyone! This weekend I was supposed to be at camp with my husband, visiting with friends and celebrating with good food and outstanding fireworks in the little town of Industry, ME (to get there, you take a right at the back of beyond which is out past the middle of nowhere), but it is worth the drive. Each year the Volunteer Fire Department puts on a glorious show as a fundraiser. A local farmer is gracious enough to let hundreds of cars into his field for the show. If you happen to be up in Maine over a 4th, be sure to look them up! Unfortunately, I'm home, not at the fireworks. My asthma decided to act up so I'm home in the air conditioning! Feeling a little better, but the meds make me very shaky, so I can't really play today, but I can type (thank goodness for the backspace key!). Now, on to the cuttlebug folders!

When I received them, I wasn't so sure that I would like them. There are 8 in the set and I could wrap my brain around several of them right away, but some of the others took a little longer, i.e. the fish and lanterns. Here are a few things I made:





This is my favorite! The paper is Rose Thicket from Sassafras. I made a gatefold card and embossed orange cardstock with a folder from the Oriental Weave collection. I used the scalloped border that was on the rose paper and a simple thank you stamp embossed on another sheet of cardstock to hold the card closed.






This card is used using the same folder. I used my brayer to roll Memories Metallic Red ink onto the positive side of the folder and then inserted black cardstock (the ink rinses off the folder fairly easily). As soon as I took the folder out of my Big Shot, I sprinkled clear embossing powder over the image and heat set it. I cut it out, embossed the sentiment and put this card together as a masculine birthday card.


I used 2 different folders on this card. Again, both come from the oriental weave assortment. I must admit, the bamboo had me stumped at first! I embossed it on to a textured-looking PP and used my Memento Rich Cocoa to highlight the embossing. I then embossed a small piece of vellum for the upper right hand corner as a backdrop for my sentiment.

The birthday card at the top of this post was done on plain cardstock from WalMart. This folder came from the plum blossom assortment. It is a wonderful flower design, I inked the edges and popped on a little bling! The edge treatment is from the Hot Off the Press Lattice Fold template which is so very versatile for cardmaking and scrapbooking!




Here are the fish I mentioned earlier! This card again uses two folders. For the first step I again used my brayer with Memories Aqua ink on the inside of my folder, ran it through my machine and let the ink dry. I then used my bone folder to flatten out the raised embossing! Because I inked it the detail stays visible. When I had it as smooth as possible, I embossed using the fish folder and then lightly inked those raised images with Memories Midnight Blue ink.

My last samples are 2 ATCs I did using the folders and wonderful stickers from Joy Crafts.

For the one on the left: after I had used my brayer and red ink for the Celebrate card above, I ran my brayer across a piece of cardstock which gave me a slight impression of the embossing folder! The Memories Metallic inks are very "juicy" and I didn't want to waste the ink. The purple one gives you a better sense of the floral folder. To both of them I added a little bling!

Again, thanks for stopping by, love to hear what you think about my designs.

Happy Birthday America!

Freedom isn't free, please thank a vet!