Plaid Thanks

The background tree image was stamped with Soot Black Distressed Ink and rubbed before it could dry. This gives it the misty, foggy look.

That is all I am up to today, have a very bad case of the flu and feel a long hot shower and bed calling me.

Happy stamping and cardmaking.

God Bless, Shelly

Safari Elephant

A fun fun card that is a great man-type birthday card. The elephant is part of the paper from DCWV's Safari stack. This is a quick easy card. The only things I put on it were the decorative scissors cut medium brown strip and the layered Happy Birthday hexagons on the left.

The Wild Women

I belong to a stamping group called The Wild Women of the West Stampers. Also known as just the Wild Women. It tickles me when my husband asks where I am going and I get to say, "To play with The Wild Women".

The stampers meet every Tuesday. I manage to make about half the meetings. The theme for the past two meetings has been paper piecing and using our scrap papers. This is one of the cards I created yesterday with "The Wild Women". (it's even fun to type it!!!)

A hexagon punch from Creating Memories (thank you Rose) was used for the quilt pieces. I sponged each edge to give added depth and definition to the hexagons. The frame was cut from Sizzix die and embossed in a Cuttlebug folder, then dark brown ink was brayered over to accent the embossing.

Sometimes I want to have the focal point be a special technique, like this quilt card, that is when I want a very small phrase or none at all.

The scraps for the hexagons are from DCWV Old World Stack.

It's A Jungle Out There

You may not be able to read the tiny phrase, so just in case, it says, "It's a jungle out there !"

A white card base that has been distressed is the first step. Now the jungle prints from DCWV are layered onto dark brown cardstock that is cut with decorative scissors. The tiger image is stamped on white, torn out, distressed and attached with 3-D foam mount. Note that the tigers eye is yellow, a felt tip marker was used for this.

The stamping of the ferns were the last step.

I Have Hope, Lamentations 3:21-23

There really is not much to explain about this card. It is fairly simple. I did use sponging around the outer edges of the card base and the label that has the scripture on it.

DCWV papers, Spellbinders dies and Our Daily Bread Designs stamps are the supplies used.

Lattice Layers

Whilst playing with my Spellbinder's Lattice Borderabilities I came up with this card. Note that the blue lattice layer is over a white lattice layer. Then the "waste" side of the borderability is also used.

The lovely phrase stamp is from Inkadinkado.

Using The Leftovers

Where are the leftovers? It's the dividing "ribbon between the prints. This is another "Thirds Card". A classic design. The one third, two thirds division is for some reason very pleasing to the eye.

Papers by DCWV. Scripture stamp from Our Daily Bread Designs and label die from Spellbinders.

Classic Thirds Card

This is a classic thirds card. One thirds of the card is one design and the two thirds is another design. The "ribbon" dividing the two can be anything narrow.

In this case these scrapbook papers are from DCWV LaCreme stack. The ribbon is from a page of striped patterns. The bottom two thirds is a flocked piece.

Placing some kind of embellishment on the ribbon adds to the card. I have used monograms, medallions, buckles or silk flowers. There are many more accents that could be used.

African Sunset

The sunset and tree are from the Safari DCWV 8x8 stack. I glued it to my card base.

The lion image is from PSX (Personal Stamp Exchange, no longer available), the phrase is from Hero Arts and I have absolutely no idea where that little animal track is from.

I used Punch Bunch punches to punch out the track and the phrase and the paint chip they are layered on. I am going to recommend The Punch Bunch as a very fine company to purchase punches from. I have NEVER had a bad punch from them. They punch clean on text and card stock weight papers. I have a lot (I mean a whole lot) of these punches and have been very satisfied with them. They are a small mom and pop company that does not sell to the large chains. You will have to go to a privately owned scrap or stamp store to find Punch Bunch punches.

Romans 8:28

This is such a phenomenal scripture. It is such a reminder to us to look past the present and into God's purposes rather than our self centered little wants.

The paper is from the DCWV LaCreme stack. Spellbinders Pendant and Label dies were used. The scripture stamp is from Our Daily Bread Designs.

The scripture has been stamped with VersaMark and embossed with fineline black powder. It was cut out in a square and the corners were cut with a CM corner rounder. Then the edges were sponged with Ranger's Jet Black Archival ink.

See that little dotted border on the black pendant die cut on the left....that was cut out of the striped multi papered paper from the LaCreme stack.

Tiger In The Jungle

I was showing my husband all the cards that I had made using the Safari papers from DCWV. He said I needed a more jungley look. Since his comments are usually pretty accurate I started playing with my fern and jungle foliage stamps on cream paper. Each type of leaf is done in a different color. I did a random stamping to cover the entire 4.25 x 5.5 inch paper. I then heavily sponged into the rectangle with Coffee Archival ink from Ranger. There is a narrow band of Ranger's Jet Black Archival ink sponged around the outer edge.

After all of the ink was applied and dried, the entire surface was heavily talced. I almost always do this before using embossing powder. Especially with a paper that has been handled as much as this one was.

The tiger image was stamped with VersaMark and embossed with fine line black embossing powder. I then carefully sponged Ranger's Marigold Distressed in over just the tiger image.

I have no idea who designed the tiger image. It was a sheet of various tiger images that I received from master stamper Eva Hays as a gift. I think the fern and leaf images are from Rubber Stamp Avenue.

When I am going to be doing a lot of inking and manipulation on a card, I don't work directly on the card front because this ink and handling tends or warp the paper. I have a stack of white and cream paper cut to card front size. When I am all done I use my Crafters Pick Ultimate glue to attach the design to the card front. It is immediately placed under the trusty college dictionary to become a very crisp smooth perfectly flat card after several hours. (also known as "booking it")

Thanks

This card is not my usualy style, but I certainly do like it. Let me begin with the stamps. I think the bare winter tree stamp is Inkadinkado. I was stamped with Soot Black Distressed Ink by Ranger that was rubbed over while the ink was still wet to create a soft misty appearance. The thanks stamp is from Morning Star Stamps. It was stamped with VersaMark ink and embossed with #12 Stone Red powder. Both the powder and the ink a products from the Tsukineko line. I had stray powder below the thanks that I didn't notice until after I had "cooked" the embossing powder. For once I liked the look of my mistake. There is sponging around the hand cut edge of the thanks/tree images.

Spellbinders dies were used to cut the dark pink label and the leaves. The gold metallic leaf is a light weight foil candy wrapper. I glued it to some text weight paper. There is a texture to the foil that is very attractive.

Papers are from DCWV Indian Summer Fall Mat Stack.

Safari

While staying with my friend Charlene in Holdrege NE she issued a challenge, "Do something with this 8x8 Safari Stack from DCWV". I never could resist a challenge.

The print papers are from DCWV's Safari stack. The goldy/brown under the happy birthday is a Dutch Boy paint chip.

I have used two different decorative scissors and punches.

The scrapbook paper covers the entire card front and presents a dramatic background.

I prefer the 8x8 or mat stacks for card making as the prints are smaller. Plus they cost less so I can have more, LOL, of course one can never have too much paper.

II Timothy 1:7

I have been gone for a while. I spent last week in Kearney NE attending workshops for my job in Agriculture Statistics. A friend commented this morning that she had noticed that I had not put anything on my blog in a while. So I'm back with one of the latest cards.

The papers are from the Citrus stack by DCWV. The scripture is a stamp from Our Daily Bread Designs, the butterfly and little flower are dies from Quickutz, embossed flower images are a Cuttlebug product and the label is from Spellbinders. I used Distressed Inks from Ranger to sponge the yellow and orange inks around the edge of the label.

I had thought that this label was going to be in the trash as I embossed the flower images backwards, meaning the flowers are indented rather then raised. Then I decided to try a little sponging to see if I could resuce it. I think I like it better than the raised embossing on some of the other cards done that were similar to this one. The embossed flower image on the plain orange paper is raised by the Cuttlebug embosing, sanded and the edge cut with a scalloped decorative scissors. You can do the sanding to expose the core of the paper if you use white core papers.