January Challenge #8

Hello!  Here's is my latest January challenge card.  The embossed holly image was in my scrappy treasure box and I dug out the class instruction sheet from Krista's class to turn it from an embossed image into a card.  I love Krista's designs, so why try to improve on perfection!  Also, I think this was supposed to be the replacement for a card from Krista's class that got used!  (Insert gasp of horror here.)

I didn't have quite all the stamps to recreate it exactly, but did the best I could.  I also didn't use the colour guide (sssshhhh - don't tell Krista!) and highlighted the berries in a different way so re-oriented the focal panel accordingly.  

Well, no stories of hockey or literary legends today.  Just another Monday around here.  Well, that's not strictly true.  There has been a rogue sheet of bubble wrap that has been floating around our house, surprising all and sundry under foot.  Tonight was my turn to get "popped" by my children, both of whom got me on separate occasions.  Well done girls, though I fear I might have created two little monsters!  Or is revenge a dish best served cold.....

January Challenge #1

Hello!  Yesterday I wrote about my new challenge for January, to make something each day from my newly weeded scrap box.  Here are the two (!) cards I made today.  The little heart panels were cut, stamped, embossed coloured and glittered and all ready to be matted and mounted on a card.  Just waiting like Little Orphan Annie for a card to come along and choose them.  Since there were two of them, it seemed only right to find them homes at the same time.

 The heart images (Sunshine Designs) were stamped and embossed in white, then coloured with Tombow markers and blended.  Then, a double-sided adhesive was applied and some warm tone ultra fine glitter was applied.  Then the images were left to languish ripen in my scrap box.

The other elements of the cards were also from my scraps box.  The card bases had been stamped for other projects and not used.  The top card has flowery hearts (Penny Black - enchanted garden) stamped in Memento Rhubarb Stalk. The sentiment is from a Stampin' Up set and is stamped in Hero Arts Raspberry Jam.  The embossing folder is from a set of two called "Bloom" and I like it for a Valentine's card because it looks like X's made of O's.  Get it?  XOXO? It's quite shocking how pleased I am by that....

The bottom card has little starbursts (Stamping Bella) stamped in two shades of pink on a Pirouette Pink card base.  The mounting panels were also bits of red and pink cardstock from my scrap box and some cream paper from my neutrals scraps. I keep all my neutrals scraps, no matter how small because they are perfect for sentiments and for popped-up accents.  I also like having little bits of black, brown and grey for accent strips, etc.  I keep them all in an increasingly battered see-through plastic envelope.  My coloured cardstock all went into a smallish box that was on-hand.  I used to keep all my bits and scraps in separate folders for Stampin' Up, and for Heather's classes, and then "other".  Now that I don't do Stampin' Up classes and only have one or two classes for Heather left, I may re-think my cardstock storage and streamline it.  In the meantime, a cardboard box is doing the trick for colourful scraps.

Well, day 1 of the challenge and I got two cards done! That should entitle me to a buffer day.  I hope not to need it, but Wednesday is looking busy so it might get used sooner rather than later!  Since I am in charge of this challenge, I henceforth permit buffer cards to be used as and when necessary.  If you are playing along, feel free to shape the rules to suit your schedule, just try to keep to the spirit of the challenge.

October Stamping Challenge #10

Hello!  Here is the latest installment of my October Stamping Challenge.  This one was made from a left over class kit and has been sitting out, waiting for a spare moment to be coloured up.  The stamp is Sunshine Designs (Flower Cluster) and stamped on shimmer cardstock and embossed in gold.  I coloured it with Tombow markers and blended it with a paintbrush.  I added some liquid pearl accents in Avocado (vines) and Lemon Yellow (round flowers) and stickles (Fruit Punch and Yellow) to finish it off.  The accent panel was embossed with a pretty spiral using a folder from a set of two called Twirl.  It has been my go-to set lately - very versatile.

This is Krista Schneider's technique, and she will be in Ottawa to teach her Tombow, Copic, multimedia, Inktense and Distress classes starting Oct 24.  Call Heather at Heather's Stamping Haven to register.  These are fantastic classes!

Thanks for stopping by!

October Stamping Challenge #1

Here's my first card for my October Stamping Challenge (see this post for the details).  I used a pre-done focal image that was a reject for a class sample at Heather's.  It's stamped on kraft with a leaf image from Sunshine Designs and painted with Twinkling H20s.  It's layered on kraft, and then on blue shimmer.  The card base was cut new, but the accent strip was from the pile next to the paper cutter, so counts as a scrap.  Should I confess to the three additional scraps I generated for this card by cutting and rejecting accent strips?  Probably not.  The new stamp I used was the background stamp - a lovely stamp from nature prints by Fred B. Mullett.  Sorry about the mustard coloured watermark on the card, and the terrible scan.  Boy, Sauron the Scanner has really started doing terrible things to my cards.  On my monitor it looks like I used my card to blot bacon.  In real life it is much less blotchy and not bad looking.  Unfortunately, it's bed time and I don't have time to figure out how to change the font colour on the watermark or threaten and/or cajole the scanner into submission.

This card did squeak in under 15 minutes, but I am going to have to be a lot more decisive or start cheating change the rules on future projects since I used the whole 15 minutes for the layout on this one considering the focal panel was completely done.  All I had to do there was doodle the border.

Hope you found some time to stamp today too! 

CASE Study Challenge #131

I came across this challenge and it was irresistible!  I was in the mood to do some colouring and some embossing and to try out something quick and easy.  Well, when a CASE presents itself like this, full of colouring and embossing and the thinking is done already, I had to try it out.  The inspiration image is by Julie Ebersole.  Isn't it pretty!  I loved it.  Now if only I could photograph my images like that!  Wow.  

As it is, I settle for Sauron the Scanner, who grudgingly translates my cards from real life to the internet.  You will just have to imagine a soft glow from the back, like Julie's has.  

I used a Sunshine Designs image and painted it with Twinkling H20s (how I do love my twinks!) and added a birthday sentiment (Stampin' Up!).  I volunteered to provide birthday cards for an outreach program my church is doing, so I think this will go in that little stash.  The background is a cover-a-card stamp by Impression Obsession.

Thanks for stopping by!

Birthday Card

Hello!  Here's a card I made today for my brother's birthday.  He's an avid video gamer, so I thought this would be a good card for him.  It's a Sunshine Designs image, one of a set of four.  I stamped it on watercolour paper and embossed it, then watercoloured it with Tombow markers, and accented with Stickles.  I added in some sound lines and Batman-style "pops" "bzzts" and "zaps" for the sound effects.  The background paper is from the Marrakesh pack of BasicGrey accent papers and the background stamp is another Sunshine Designs cube.  The card base is Mellow Mossand I added a final accent of dimensional pearls (Ranger) in Denim.  A quick card that was good for using some paper scraps.  The longest time is figuring out the layout.  It's also quicker to decide on the paper and then choose the marker colours.  Edited to add:  This is more vibrant in real life but Sauron the Scanner hates me and refused to cooperate.  I tinkered with my photo editing software to the full extent of my patience to no avail.  You'll just have to picture it brighter :-)

Thanks for stopping by!

PS  A huge thank you to the ladies who came out to my calendar class at Heather's Stamping Haven last week.  I had a wonderful time!

Calendar Class

Calendar - closed

Hello!  Happy New Year!  Hard to believe 2012 is upon us, isn't it.   Here is my first class this year at Heather's Stamping Haven - a 2012 desk calendar.  It will be a two-part workshop on Saturday, January 14th.  Please contact Heather at the store to register. 

In the morning, we will do the images and you will learn the essentials of Krista Schneider's popular technique for watercolouring with Tombow markers.  In the afternoon, we will make the calendar pages and assemble the calendar. 

Calendar open to January 2012



Calendar Pages











I really had fun making this calendar and I would be hard pressed to pick a favourite page.  I think I could narrow it down to three contenders: the bunny, the witch, and the poppy.  I used Sunshine Designs and Heather's Stamping Haven images as they lend themselves so well to the technique, but also because there is tremendous variety to choose from, seasonal and floral and birds...gorgeous.  This calendar also has two bonus pages for 2013, which presented some challenges to DH to understand (in his engineer's world, calendars have 12 months you see).  I said it was because years are only randomly selected points in time, roughly timed to include one trip around the sun and any old pope can make one up.  Plus, we are making this later in January, so the two extra months are to make up for that.  Also, a calendar that will go to February will allow people to purchase their 2013 calendars at deep discounts in February, thus offsetting the cost of the class.  He remained unconvinced.  I, on the other hand, thought it was great to be able to include the extra months, which is the whole reason you *make* things, not buy them, because then they get to be how *you* want them. 

Hope to see you at Heather's on January 14th!  It's going to be a great class and a lot of fun. 

ATC Class Nov 12th

Hello! Just a quick post this morning before I dash off to work. Here are the ATCs I made for an upcoming class at Heather's Stamping Haven. It's going to be from 2-5 on Saturday, November 12th. If you'd like to take the class, please register with the store.

I tried to make ATCs in several different styles, and I will also give people some sketched designs for how to use ATCs as card-starters.

I love all of them, but I think my favourite is the Snowy Day one, which has some surprises hidden inside.

Hope to see you on the 12th! In the meantime, I am going to be a parent volunteer on the kindergarten field trip. Naturally it's the coldest day we've had so far, 8 degrees, windy and rainy. Good thing I'm made of stern stuff. Then tomorrow and Saturday are the all-day classes with Krista Schneider at Heather's! Can't wait - two full days of colouring with Copics and Tombows, 18 projects over the two days. I love it.

Thanks for stopping by!

PS. Stamps: Heather's Stamping Haven, Sunshine Designs, Hero Arts (gold flower), Stampers Anonymous (butterfly ATC). Sorry about the formatting. Ran out of time and patience to get it any better.

Colouring, colouring and more colouring!

Hello! I've been doing some therapeutic colouring lately while watching tv with hubby. I stamped off a bunch of images (Sunshine Designs) with Memento Tuxedo Black onto Heather's 130 lb cardstock and coloured them different colour ways with Copic markers. Last night I had a few minutes while hubby was working on some committee stuff, so I took some time to turn them into cards. Basic formula: find matching cardbase and Basic Grey paper, mat, layer, etc. and finish off with Stickles and Dimensional Pearls. The big flowers got a sentiment in the white space (Stampin' Up). I think my favourite is the yellow flower card. My nephew's favourite was the blue flower card. I sprayed some Delphinium glimmer mist on the background paper for some subtle sparkle in the background. If you're interested, the coloured papers from top to bottom are: PTI lavender moon paper with pattern from BG Kioshi; Stampin' Up Really Rust with paper from BG Scarlett's Letter; Heather's dark purple cardstock (and a SU Sage Shadow mat) with BG LilyKate; SU So Saffron card base with paper from BG Perhaps.

NSR: Just finished reading a Kate Atkinson novel, Started Early, Took My Dog. It's the 3rd or 4th Jackson Brodie mystery and it was really good. Dark, but with great dashes of humour here and there. Also, her books always weave together numerous threads that are seemingly unrelated.

Inkurable Stampers May Challenge

Here's my entry for the May challenge at Inkurable Stampers, theme of "Food". I debated for a while about which stamp to use: artichoke, radish/beet, cutlery, dessert, chocolate bunny, Fred B Mullett fish. Then I opened my drawer of pear stamps (should I feel abashed to type that?) and selected several favourites. This was the one that ultimately got picked (Sunshine Designs) and I spent ages colouring and blending and blending and colouring (Tombow technique -take Krista's class at Heather's in June!). Then I pried the top off my Liquid Crackle Accents (no patience whatsoever to apply tiny drop by tiny drop to large area), and applied liberally to all three pears, envisioning a lovely porcelain effect. I did NOT envision a horrific mess as the Liquid Accents caused all red ink to run into the yellow. Hideous and unsalvageable (and I will salvage almost anything). Grr. Luckily I remembered which 47 markers I used (which comforts me when I wonder the rest of the time if I have early-onset dementia) and coloured it up quickly. Next came the laborious steps of turning into a card. I must have matted and layered this thing 50 times. I discovered that the wrinkly piece of Japanese paper will release anything without too much trouble, as will gold metallic. Eventually I settled on this. It's a warm khaki linen card base with pear words (A Stamp in the Hand) and edged it with Memories Art Print Brown. A little scrap of Bazzil in burgundy anchored it, and I also edged the Japanese paper, which has lovely metallic flecks in it mostly hidden. But I know they're there! Then a piece of ivory tsumugi, and then gold metallic and then black and then the image. One version of the card had patterned paper in there (matted to boot!), but that was definitely two layers too many. It looked ok up close, colours were fine, everything worked, but at arm's length the design was definitely off. I'm not sure about the final result, but I had pried and re-taped and tested every piece of paper I own. This is as good as it gets. I may yet try my crazed porcelain technique with Copics, but I am sufficiently crazed at the moment without the addition of crackle accents. Thanks for stopping by!

Christmas card

Hello! Here's a Christmas card that I've been working on since August. That is to say, I coloured up the main image on holidays and recently put together the card itself. I did up a dozen of them, which is a good number to get efficient use of paper, design time, but not get sick of doing them. (I don't like mass producing things - I get bored of doing the same thing over and over.) The main image is Sunshine Designs, stamped and embossed in Espresso and coloured with Tombow markers, accented with stickles. The blue panel is stamped with another Sunshine Designs stamp, sort of a holly/mistletoe sprig in the same vein as the focal image. I stamped it in white, then a Cornish Heritage Farms Christmas greeting in Van Dyke Brown. The mats are chocolate brown, and the card base is a lovely rich, deep red. The accent panel is vanilla linen, embossed with snowflakes. All the bits and pieces are edged in Memories Art Print Brown. This card came quickly together once I got the layout and 12 cards are now in the stash ready to be filled out, addressed and mailed.

No jokes today, I'm afraid. I'm feeling very sombre today, as it's Remembrance Day in Canada. We Canadians pause to remember and give thanks for all those who stand, and stood, in harm's way to defend freedom and peace. Nameless in their multitudes, but each named and known and cherished by their Maker and their loved ones. Lest we forget.

Arch #16 Birds

Ok, this arch (#16, Birds, for Inkurable Stampers) was a bit of a stretch for me. I wanted to do something a bit different, softer colours, more stamps, less 'stuff'. I assembled the various bird stamps from my collection of Sunshine Designs stamps (The Stamp Barn), as well as twiggy branchy bits, and some general design elements. I chose 3 colours of Distress ink, got out the sticky notes, and went to work. (Or should I say play!) The colours are Victorian Velvet, Stormy Sky and Peeled Paint. (I'm not positive on the green - I made this about a week ago.) I stamped, I sponged, I coloured (with Copic/Promarker) and highlighted with glitter pen and pearl paint. I also emphasized the borders between the areas with a black marker. In the end I decided I liked it enough to post, but I'm not in love with it. Still, it met the criterion to have fun trying something new, that was a bit of a stretch for me. (Except for the crooked "Happy" - that's my signature style!) I had the dickens of a time finding a word stamp for that panel. I guess that's where a bit of planning would have come in handy. Now that would be a real stretch for me!



Thanks for stopping by!

Gothic Arch #2 - Lace

This is Arch #2 - Lace from the Inkurable Stampers Gothic Arch Challenge. I wanted something soft and vintage looking to go with one of the few bits of lace I have around. I found this wonderful (repro) vintage French soap label in my stash and immediately fell in love with it. I picked up on the reds in the clover with the background arch (Cherry Cobbler) and added some clover stamps (Sunshine Designs - The Stamp Barn) embossed in Garnet. This embossing powder has reds, gold and dark purples in it - gorgeous. The dark colour is a very dark green, to pick up the leaves, and I also punched a corner scroll and trimmed it to fit the top of the arch, which needed a little something. The bee (Anna Griffith) is stamped in versafine and sponged with Antique Linen. This might be one of my favourite arches so far, with the reds and the pretty clovers. And I learned a new French word!

Thanks for stopping by.

PS. We watched the Simpsons season premiere last night. I don't know what made me tape it since we haven't watched the show in three or four years, but I did. And guess who the guest stars were - Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement, of Flight of the Conchords. A little bit freaky! It was really funny - they were art camp counsellors, with lots of their trademark guitar & comedy.

Inkurable Stampers - September Challenge

Here's my card for the September challenge, "Shoes", over at Inkurable Stampers. I had a few ideas floating around in my head for this challenge, but when it came down to it, I needed some comfort-colouring time. I chose this stamp, a favourite from Sunshine Designs (through The Stamp Barn), and went with shades of brown except for the one green shoe. I briefly dallied with blue, but after I realized my mistake, I left it alone. Possibly will do another flower to hide it, but I have had to do that before and that little flower is a pain in the neck to cut out. I may live with the blue. I cunningly chose a piece of patterned paper with a bit of blue on it, which I see I have obscured with the flower. Sigh. What can I say? I told you I needed some tlc :-) Anyway, these shoes were stamped in gold, embossed with Bavarian Bronze, and coloured with Tombow markers. I also added a red crystal to the red flower. The sentiment is a rub-on. I wanted a stamp that said "one of a kind", but mine was too big and wrong shape. So handy-sized rub-on it was. The patterned paper is Stella Ruby (BasicGrey). I felt the bottom needed some balance, so I rootled around in the flower stash and found this one. It looked too flat, so I thought I would stamp it. Surely there would be a nice text-y stamp on my desk? No. All put away. (how odd!). I did find a slightly black speckled Tim Holtz border, and thought that might do. While it was getting buttoned and assembled it looked fine. After glued down, realized it looks like tire tracks. At least now I know that if I need tire tracks for a project, I can use that stamp!

Thanks for stopping by!

A special baby card

Here's a special card for a special mother-to-be. I was at a shower today for a stamping friend of mine so the pressure was on to make a lovely card. We don't know if it's a boy or girl, so the colours are neutral. (I asked DH if the card was too boyish and he said "It's just boyish enough." Nrnrnrnrn - wrong answer! Must remember not to ask him for feedback.)

I started with making the background, which I wanted to look like a quilt, since my friend likes sewing and I think she's even done quilts. I punched out a bunch of squares with a 3/4" square punch and PTI patterned paper. I stuck with paper from the same line so it would coordinate and make my life easier. I glued down the squares with a glue stick (you can wiggle them a bit after they're stuck - handy for lining them up) onto a square of Whisper White, but any cardstock will do. Once all was stuck down and trimmed neatly, I pierced holes using my piercing guide (SU) and embroidered the little x's with embroidery floss. I thought it needed a bit more oomph, so I did the edge too. That was a bit of a minor undertaking because once you've started, you can't really stop. Still, when it was finished, it really was worth it, and pre-piercing meant it didn't take that long to do. And quilts do need a binding, don't they. At this point the trick was to find something that wouldn't totally cover up all the x's, so I went with a small focal point, image and sentiment. The image is a Sunshine Designs stamp, coloured with Tombows and blended, accented with stickles. The sentiment is Stampin' Up, inked with markers to get the two different colours. This is easy - just use the brush tip of a marker and colour the portions of the rubber in the colour you want. Huff on it before you stamp to reactivate the ink. I felt this card needed a ribbon, so I added a nice taffeta bow (Stampin' Up), as well as some stick-on half-back pearls (Hero Arts). The card base is the light green from PTI, and the mat for the sentiment is Baja Breeze. I see that the scanner didn't catch the bottom of the card. This is actually a 5 1/4" square card.

The shower, by the way, was lovely. The hostess made us all feel so welcomed and taken care of. There were really fun games, including baby present bingo and "what's in your purse" (You got points for having things on the list in your purse. Clearly the list was not developed with my purse in mind, as I tend to have peculiar things in my purse. I have had on occasion, though not all at the same time, and as recently as today: a plate, a can of evaporated milk, rubber stamps (obviously), diapers, a multitude of crayons, a stainless steel water bottle, and an underwire wire. Right now my purse weighs a ton since I found about $8.75 in change in my desk, mostly nickels, packing for the move. I defy any mugger to make off with my purse without needing to file a workers' comp claim for back injury. I feel like I should be McGyver's wife - I could help him escape from any sticky situation with only the contents of my purse.) There were lots of stampers at the shower, so the baby cards were incredible. So creative and lovely. And the food - the table groaned with the feast. (There was a brunch with the shower.) Our hostess is an incredible cook, and everything from scratch, beautifully presented, with flowers from her garden artfully arranged here and there. Amazing in every way.

Baby cards

Here are a couple of baby cards for the bazaar stash. Once again, I borrowed one of Krista Schneider's layouts for this cute little Sunshine Designs baby. It's coloured with Tombows and accented with Stickles. This Kioshi paper makes great baby card patterned paper. It's sort of soft and pastel, without being cloyingly sweet. This palette of PTI light yellow and SU Marigold Morning makes a nice gender-neutral baby card. I like how these turned out! The light yellow panel is embossed through the cuttlebug (bird and vine folder) and the dark yellow panel is stamped with the moon stamp from the same cube. Well, mine is the cling version, so 4 stamps, but originally they were sold on cubes. I finally caved and bought it. For ages I've loved it and used my mother's, but it and she live far away so it was time to get my own. It's a baby set that really appeals to me - cute, but not too cute, and gender neutral, with this image, the moon, a pram, and a onesie.

Apologies for the big rant on the last post. The bees in my bonnet were a-buzzing! To get out of my grump, I reflected on my many blessings for which I am deeply grateful. Here are the ones that relate to my grumblings yesterday.

- a job in a time of economic uncertainty, even if my new cubicle isn't as nice as my old one

- a husband who is willing to sort out all the television-related problems (even if it's his new system that's causing them to begin with but I digress)

- a place to park that's close to work that's not a small fortune

- happy memories of a fresh new pack of Laurentian pencil crayons every fall, especially Cherry Red and Peacock Blue

- Rogers: their logo is red. I like red.

Thanks for stopping by!

TGIF!!!

Same layout, same stamp cube, different colour palette, different looks! These were fun little images to colour, and so easy using the colour guide I got to go with them. I also borrowed the layout from a Christmas class I took with Krista Schneider. These images are from Sunshine Designs, available at Heather's Stamping Haven or through The Stamp Barn. If you're interested in some great colouring classes, Krista will be back at Heather's at the end of October. I'm signed up and I can't wait! The projects are always wonderful and Krista is an excellent teacher.

The top card is in a spring palette, and with the colour of the flower, I went with background papers from the Kioshi pack (BasicGrey), and sentiment is a rub on.

The bottom card is more fall-inspired uses the Indian Summer pack (BasicGrey), with another rub on. Fortunately I noticed that I had stamped "may every part of your birthday have happy in it" on the inside of the card that says "thank you" on the outside and was able to cover it up with a liner.

I would really be a force to be reckoned with if I had come with both halves of the wit....

NSR: we had our intake interview with the Kindergarten teacher today. She seems really great and DD2 had a good time checking out her classroom. The province's intake form is about 8 pages long and requires you to remember things like your child's first word (and date), first two-word phrase (and date), and first sentence (and date). I put "good grief, child #2, have no idea". It turns out these are official Ministry forms that get put on the child's official record. Lovely. I hope they file it under "Parent with sense of proportion" not under "Potential dissident with little respect for authority manifested in disregard for official forms".

Speaking of dissidents, I have several bees in my bonnet at the moment. In no particular order:

- am boycotting Newell-Rubbermaid and their legion subsidiaries for discontinuing Laurentian pencil crayons

- am livid with Rogers for their abysmal cable service. They claim that our broken PVR is just a bad signal. We had the cable guy a while ago tell us that our signal was the best he's ever seen. Who do I believe - the guy with the tools or the tool at the call centre? Hmm. Now we have to be home on Sunday afternoon to wait for cable guy.

- They are assigning parking spots in the garage at work, in order of who pays for their monthly pass. I like parking to the right, away from the pillars, on the end near my work, not near the other office building and not in the basement and not at the top. The odds of me getting that spot by chance seem slim. They have given no reason for this change, so this sort of arbitrary upheaval really gets on my nerves. Luckily the guy who owns the garage is some sort of real estate magnate so he is likely to be quite sympathetic to our pleas for the status quo.

- PVR/Rogers woes mean I will lose those new episodes of Hustle I never got to see, the episodes from the new season of Spooks and a couple of Inspector Lewises. I know it's only TV, but I don't watch it all the time and I like to have some guaranteed good shows to watch of an evening to unwind. Yes, there are a few shows I can watch On Demand, assuming the On Demand is working, which it frequently isn't, and demand as I might, not all the shows I want are available on demand. (One of the deceptions of advertising. I guess "On Occasion" didn't test well in the focus groups.)

Well there you have it. Good thing I have stamping or I would be a total basket case!

More cards for the stash

I've been busy colouring up a storm. We've been trying to clear off our PVR so we can get it replaced. We have a lot of shows taped off, but they are all corrupted and won't play back without being all pixellated and pause-y and stammery. It's really annoying and we have deleted everything except the shows we really want to watch. So, we have been watching the last season of Spooks, or MI-5 as it was called on American broadcasts. It doesn't broadcast very often, so we are putting up with the poor quality of viewing and are able to piece together most of the plot. Anyway, colouring while I watch helps me get through the worst of the poor recording as well as the scary scenes.

Once I had a tidy pile of little coloured images (Sunshine Designs by the Stamp Barn), I mounted them on some Early Espresso mats and turned them into cards. These ones are for the bazaar stash. The top one has a blue and orange colour scheme, with patterned paper picking up the colours (this is how I tell myself it's a good thing to have so many Basic Grey 6x6 packs - I can match any colour scheme...and now two more are out there that are wooing me with their siren song). The card base is a new SU colour, Pear Pizzazz and the sooner I can use it up the better. I'm not falling in love with this green - I like a yellower green and I find this one a bit flat.

The bottom card is another birdhouse from the same cube, this time blue, yellow and green. The card base is a mis-stamped scrap, with the worst of the slippage covered up. I didn't have a green mat to match, so I made one with distress inks (a handy tip to get a good colour match). I was doing all right with my Dimensional Pearl (mushroom - a lovely pearly colour, way nicer than it seems like it's going to be, burdened with a name like "Mushroom") embellishments, but I see that by the all-seeing eye of Sauron the Scanner, they seem to be in ascending order of size, matryoshka doll-style. I'll pretend it was meant to be that way. Besides, the lighting at the church bazaar isn't very good and these will be in plastic sleeves. I did dither about the American spelling of neighbour, but wasn't willing to go to extremes in rub-on reconfiguration for a card that will be sold on the cheap. Again, will rely on dim lighting and plastic glare to disguise my slightly anti-Canadian sentiment. (Let the record show that I love my country deeply and pepper my written communication with u's at every oppourtunity. And I always say "zed" and "about" the right way.) Also, there are quite a few snowbirds in the parish, so possibly one of them will have a new American neighbour requiring a welcoming card. Or am I overthinking things????

Sunny sunflower

Hello! Here's another card for my bazaar stash. I made it using a piece I rejected when developing a stamping class. I stamped the sunflower (Sunshine Designs) on some red sparkle paper and heat embossed it in black. That got rejected for class purposes. Fast forward several months and I grabbed the piece to see what I could do with it. I coloured it with Bruynzeel pencil crayons (a base coat of white seemed to work best) and accented with Distress stickles. I went a bit funky with the background. I must have been inspired by our Mexican-themed cottage this summer and all its brightly coloured accessories. (Cottage was fantastic BTW, had a wonderful time. Would go back in a flash.)

The colour looks a bit off on my scan - the blue panel is Pacific Point and the card base is Crushed Curry. Picture the colour amped up about 50 watts. (Hubby is telling me that nothing can be "amped up". I should say "amplified". Now he's grilling me on the difference on colour intensity and brightness. Something about something being exactly the same red only blinding and something being different red and not blinding. I lost track somewhere in the middle. And now he is refusing to replay his conversation "if this is going to be fodder, that's f-o-d-d-e-r." I'm busted! In his defence he thought I was working on presentation for work so he was trying to spare me shame and humiliation in front of audience of experts. Kindly meant, but futile - shame and humiliation will be inevitable, hence me working on blog post instead of presentation.) Anyway, picture the card amped up 300 volts per metre squared. That's how bright it is. Or in Spinal Tap terms, this card goes all the way up to 11. tee hee hee!

Other various touches: things edged in Artprint Brown (a la Krista Schneider), background stamped in Sunflower from one of the Sunshine Designs flower cubes, and little Terra Cotta dots (Adirondack dimensional pearls, again a la Krista). Yummy, yummy, yummy. I like this one. It's totally outside my normal comfort zone (ie blinding colour scheme) but I thought it would be good to have a variety for the bazaar and sometimes it's fun to just throw caution and good sense (taste?) to the wind and see what happens.

Thanks for looking!

PS Date set for zombie class at Heather's! Afternoon Sat Oct 2. If you don't want to do zombies, you can do ordinary colouring, but make sure you keep your cards away from the zombie ones so they don't "turn". tee hee hee.

Gothic Arch #12 Fabric

Hello! Well, DH has done a herculean job of getting the computer functioning with everything I need (photo editing software and blog capabilities, and email). Other things are even working too, like word processing and spreadsheets. It's always a lot of work getting a home computer all loaded up with things. Anyway, it seems to be ok now and I am ready to post.

As I've mentioned before, I'm a big fan of the blog Stamping Mathilda, and it was there that I learned of the Gothic Arch challenge on Inkurable Stampers. I thought I'd start at the current challenge (#12, Fabric).

Sidebar on drawing a Gothic Arch:

Before I got started, though, I needed to draw an arch. I googled "How to draw a Gothic arch" and got quite a few hits. The first one was more for artists who actually want to draw these things and was three pages of art terms and math. Moving on.... The next one was "Mathematics and mysticism", which was quite intriguing. Turned out to be a lot of math, not too much mysticism and a basic explanation of how to draw these things on large blocks of stone using a pencil and a piece of string. Undeterred, I read on, to discover that I could draw a circle, with a square inside, and draw evermore complex geometric shapes with tremendous precision and eventually wind up with a Gothic arch. However, since I am not a medieval mason building a stone monolith that really shouldn't collapse due to slipshod arches, precision isn't quite that important to me. It turns out that if you draw two intersecting circles of equal radius, the intersection will give you a Gothic arch (fig. 3 in link above). So that is what I did. (And once again I am grateful to DH for being an engineer and having kept his super duper Staedtler [sp?] compass from drafting class). If you don't have a compass, you can rig one up with string and two pencils. I had also thought that tracing a Nestability circle would work, but I didn't need to do that. I made an arch from scrap cardstock that is my template for all of them.

Back to Stamping!

The challenge was to incorporate fabric into the arch, so I stamped my image (Sunshine Designs, The Stamp Barn) onto some aida cloth that I pinked with shears. I coloured the flowers with Tombows, reinforcing the line with my microliner. I embellished it with embroidery (stems) and beads. I didn't have yellow beads, so I used clear and coloured them with a yellow Copic marker.

The background is Almost Amethyst (SU), stamped with a wonderful vintage image of a marriage certificate (Heather's Stamping Haven, and this stamp is actually Heather's own grandmother's marriage certificate! neat!!!). I also added some larger words about cherishing, etc. that are from a Darkroom Door set.

The navy panel is navy metallic paper, run through the Victorian Cuttlebug folder and rubbed with black paint (Adirondack) and then rubbed off so the shine only shows on the raised portion. I rummaged through all my buttons to find this perfect one that says "Paris" on it and tied a crochet cotton bow throw it.

Here is a close up of the button

bit. I normally don't go in for these arbitrary closeups of things, but I am really in love with that button, so if you have made it this far through the blog, I will reward [?] you with a close up of it. Also you can see the stickles and the stamps on the embroidery a bit better too. The photo isn't great, or at least my photo editing skills are not great. I have this superfabulouswonderific software that is 1000x smarter than me and I have no idea how to use any of it. Everything is in technical terms that mean nothing to me and every step is broken down into tiny, tiny steps involving thousands of clicks so that you can customize your every quasar. All this to say is that I ain't bright 'nuff to figger the durn thing out.

Thanks for stopping by! I have several more arches :-)

Check out the challenge, and maybe try it out yourself! Warning: you will get hooked :-)