LIM74 - Let's see Shiny!

It's the third Saturday of the month, and the Less is More challenge on week three each month is a theme challenge.  This week, Chrissie and Mandi want to see something "shiny" on our cards.  

On this first card, I used GinaK stamps.  I stamped the vase image on a piece of shiny red card stock. I think this paper must have been in my stash for several years now....so it's good to be using some of the stash.  I stamped the flowers (after inking stamp with Memento markers), then colored in the red blooms.  I added a touch of white doodles on the vase.  I'm amazed they dried and didn't smear!  The sentiment is also from the GinaK collection.  I sponged in a base for the vase to sit on and popped the vase on pop dots. I'm guessing everyone is having as much trouble as I am trying to get a good photo of something "shiny"!!  Trust me...it's a VERY shiny red...see the reflection on the black card stock?  

I think my second card might just be my favorite.  I cut the bird cage (with the Cameo) from very shiny gold card stock.  The birds, heart, limb, and leaves were also cut with the Silhouette (Cameo).  I curved the cage and popped up just the centers on each end to give it a rounded look.  The birds, leaves, heart, and limb were colored with Copics and adhered straight to the card.  I did lift the bottom of the limb to the outside of the card. Sentiment is from a Flourishes set.

This is a new stamp from Lily of the Valley that was part of my prize for winning last month's challenge from St. Luke's Charity Challenge. I was so excited to win! Isn't this a fab stamp!  I actually won two different stamps.  This image actually was the little girl carrying a birthday cake.  I stamped the image and cut away the cake and arranged the strings from the balloons through her hands.  I sponged a little ground under her feet, and added a couple of tuffs of grass with a GinaK stamp. I colored the image with Copics.  The balloons were cut with the Silhouette (Cameo).  In order to have "shiny" on this card, I coated each of the balloons with some glossy accents.  It's very difficult to get it to show up right though!

This last card was just something I was playing around with. Not too sure I really like the finished product...but I thought I'd show it to you anyway.  I stamped the circles using a PTI image.  Then I punched small circles with a hole puncher from all the different shiny papers I had laying on my desk.  In retrospect, I probably shouldn't have popped them up on the card, and just adhered them to the circles.  The shiny white spots are made with stickles.  Birthday sentiment is a PTI stamp that I stamped in red then heat embossed it with clear.  I tried to heat emboss with red, but made a MAJOR mess of several cards, so I finally gave up and stamped in red and embossed in clear! 

Sharing a layout I did recently of my Daddy and two of my sister's children.  

I used My Mind's Eye papers Follow your Heart for this layout. The border on the Kraft colored paper is purposely crooked, and it totally messed with my mind trying to get my layout on straight! LOL! I cut three large banners to layer behind my photo. The round lacy circle behind the photo was made by cutting about a 6 inch circle and then using one of my corner punches to punch around the edges. Circles on the top left corner were punched with circle punches. I also added two brads from the Follow Your Heart collection. Butterflies were punched with a MS punch, and I added a little glitter and glossy accents to each of them...as well as a red dot of liquid pearls for the body. The title tag and the brown piece backing it was made on the Cameo. I added a couple of lines of red stitching down the side of one of the banner strips. The "unique" scalloped piece on the bottom right was cut from a matching piece of paper and layered over one just like it with pop dots to give it a little dimension. Journaling is tucked behind the photo and reads: 

From my earliest memories, swinging with my Daddy (your Grandpa Perdue) was something we all looked forward to at the end of the day. He would always sing to us and keep that swing moving. The tradition carried on to all of our children, and any time we went to visit, there would always be a grandchild or two swinging with Grandpa. Sarah and Benjamin were so lucky to live next door to Grandpa and Grandma….that meant they got LOTS of extra swing time! Just look at the smiles on their faces. We were all so fortunate to have such a loving and fun-loving Daddy and Grandpa! 

That's all for me tonight.  Thanks so much for stopping by.  Your comments always make me happy...and I sincerely appreciate you taking the time to leave a comment!  Until next time...

Hugs!

OLW92 - On the Edge

The One Layer Wednesday challenge is hosted this week by Susan at Simplicity. Susan has challenged us to created a card with the stamping "on the edge"....not OFF the edge...but on the edge..any edge.  

For my card, I chose to use a stamp from the bicycle set from Hero Arts.  The sentiment is from SU....and the balloons were hand drawn...just because I don't have any balloon stamps.  I colored the balloons with Copics and sponged in a touch of grass under the bicycle.  Easy peasy!

That's my take on this week's challenge.  Thanks a million for stopping by! I appreciate all of your comments and the fact that you take the time to leave me a comment!  Until next time....

Hugs!

I've Been Featured at Basic Grey

I got happy mail today.  I received an email notifying me that one of my layouts was featured on the Basic Grey blog. I love the Basic Grey Lauderdale collection and the papers were a perfect match for this cute photo of my adorable granddaughters!

Just because my layout was selected at the "Eye Spy" layout for June 2, 2012, I'll be receiving some Basic Grey goodies in the mail! How exciting is that!

That's all for now...just wanted to share my news!  Have a wonderful day!  Until next time...

Hugs!

Zendala Dare 9

On Friday's a new Zendala Dare is posted by Erin at The Bright Owl.  Here's our challenge template for this week's dare:

For some reason, I had a tough time with this template...but I finally got it done!

Thanks so much for stopping by!  If you want to see what some of the other's did with this template, hop on over to The Bright Owl and check out the other Zendalas.

Thanks so much for all your wonderful comments!  I appreciate the time you take to leave a comment for me!  Until next time...

Hugs!

Challenge 74 - Eccentric Circles

The challenge this week at I am the Diva is to create a tile using eccentric circles (meaning not having a common center) and not perfectly round...okay, I can draw some not quite round circles!  I ended up using a mono tangle (striping) for my tangle....with that one small exception...can you see it?

I might just do another before the week is out, but right now, this is my "eccentric circles" tangle.  If you'd like to see some of the other gorgeous work in the challenge, just pop on over to the challenge blog and take a peek at some of them!

Thanks a million for stopping by!  Your comments are always appreciated and they most definitely brighten my day!!  Until next time...

Hugs!

LIM71 - With Flourish(es)

The challenge this week at Less is More is a one layer card challenge.  Oh, how we use to dread the one layer week.  I think everyone has adjusted to making one layer cards. I know I have...in fact, I make one layer cards a good bit of the time.  So, this should be easy peasy...but wait!  There's more!  Chrissie and Mandi have spiced the challenge up a bit, but asking us to include a "flourish" on our card.  I love flourishes...except when I have to use them!  Of course, that's always the case in these challenges...you do something all the time...and then when you MUST use a specific item or technique...the mind goes totally blank! I did manage to come up with several cards.  This is definitely not my best week, but it's passable.  

This first card is actually the last card I made today.  I think I like it best.  I used a very old Technique Tuesday flower stamp (and the leaves). Stamped the image in black memento, then masked it off and stamped the flourish which I think is an old Rhonda Farrar stamp.  Then lastly, I stamped the big leaf and then stamped the small leaf on the flourish.  (I added a small hand drawn line to attach the leaf to the flourish).  Colored the image with Copics, and stamped a sentiment from PTI.  I added a few pearls...I'm hoping Mandi will allow me to get away with it! LOL!

This was the first card I made and I wasn't overly thrilled with it.  Somehow, it just seems sorta blah.  The flourishes are from goodness knows where...had them forever!  The sentiment is from Flourishes.  Everything is stamped in one of the new Memento colors - Teal Zeal.

This card sounded better in my head than it actually turned out.  I used Flourishes stamps for the leaf stamping, PTI swirls, and the sentiment is from Flourishes.  I stamped the first leaf with embossing ink and heat set it with clear embossing powder.  I don't think I got it quite wet enough for the embossing powder because it didn't get embossed enough.  Then I stamped a few green leaves with DI - peeled paint and the PTI swirls with the same ink.  Then I sponged the background with the same DI. If my embossing had been a little crisper, I think this would have been really great.

This last one is just something I was playing with and thought I slip it in and see if Chrissie and Mandi noticed that it might be just a little too much "more" and not enough less....just sayin...

I have another wedding layout to share with you today too.  

Our beautiful granddaughter, Stephanie at her wedding on April 28, 2012. I used a combination of some old papers from my stash. There is some MME, GCD, card stock, and some iridescent vellum on this layout. The blooms are some very old Prima flowers from my HUGE stash. I added some pearls for the centers, a few pearl flourishes. The white strip on the darker blue is some old lacy tape that I believe was from K&Co. The butterfly was one I made a while back that I didn't use and put it in my "scrap/embellie" box for future use. I added a satin bow to help balance the layout, and a metal tag at the bottom that says "The Perfect Day". Title work "Bride" was cut with the Cameo and I hand wrote "beautiful" with a white gel pen. I used a MS deep edge punch for the lacy vellum borders and outlined them with a white pen. Then just a small strip of the GCD paper behind the vellum. Journaling is rather long and wouldn't fit on the front (and look right) so I adhered it to the back of the layout. Journaling reads:

Stephanie, you were our first grandchild. I was only 31 at the time, and Traci, Kimmer, and Matthew were 7, 5, and 3. I might not have been “old” enough to be a grandmother, but your Papa and I were thrilled when your Dad called to tell us you were born. Papa and I watched as your Dad walked you down the beach to meet Matt. Pensacola Beach was the perfect spot to get married. The weather was beautiful that day…but not as beautiful as you! I can’t tell you how proud we are of you and all you’ve accomplished. You were a gorgeous bride, and Matt is a very lucky guy. You took my breath away that day and brought a tear to my eye. I’ve always felt that you and I had a special bond and I feel blessed to call you my granddaughter. We love you and we were so happy that we could be there for your special day! Love you! Nana

That wraps it up for me today. Thanks so much for stopping by and for leaving me one of your wonderful comments!  Your comments always make my day a little brighter!  Until next time....

Hugs!

OLW91 - Thank You

This week's One Layer Wednesday Challenge is hosted by Jennifer at Styles Ink.  Jennifer has challenged us to make a one layer thank you card for a teacher.  HELLO!  I have absolutely no use for a teacher thank you card (since my children are all in their 30s)....but just a regular 'ol thank you card I can always use!  So, with the challenge in mind, I've made a couple of cards...that...well, whadda ya know!  I believe they would be suitable for a teacher, or anyone else!

Apples...teachers like apples, right?  For this card I used an image from the Flourishes Apple of my Eye set.  I stamped the first apple, then masked it off and stamped the other two apples behind it.  I colored the apples with Prisma pencils and then added a touch of shading to ground the images.  The sentiment is from PTI.

This card is actually the first card I made and being less than thrilled with the outcome, I decided to make the apple card.  For this card, I used PTI stamps.  Stamped in Memento black, then colored the pencil with a mix of Copics and Prismas.  Very....simple? plain?  

That's all for me right now.  Head on over to Styles Ink and play along in the challenge this week...even if you don't have school age children, I bet you could always use a thank you card! 

Thanks so much for stopping by!  I appreciate you taking the time to pop in and I especially appreciate you leaving a comment!! Until next time...

Hugs!

Diva Challenge 73 - Bridging the Gap

For the weekly challenge from Laura at I am the Diva, we've been challenged to create a tile using the tangle Bridgen.   I did a couple of tiles for the challenge this week.

For my first tile, I decided to add a little color with my Prisma pencils.  I'm not too sure how I like it with the color...but perhaps it will grow on me!

Not being entirely happy with my colored tangle, I gave it another go and this time just used a graphite pencil for shading.  I can't decide which I like best!

That's it for now. Thanks a million for taking the time to stop by and thank you for your uplifting comments!  Until next time...

Hugs!

Zendala Dare 8

On Fridays there's a new Zendala Challenge dare posted at The Bright Owl by Erin.  Erin gives us a zendala template and we are to fill it in with tangles.  The results are always amazing!  No matter how many of us submit a zendala to the challenge, they all look different...and oh so pretty!  Here's the template we have to work from this week.  As an additional challenge this week, we've been asked to fill the template below with at least one tangle that starts with L, one with O, one with V and one with E.  You get it, a L-O-V-E  Zendala.

The tangles I chose to use for my tile are:  Lilypads, Onamato, Vache 1, and Ecohism.  I love how this turned out!

My tile is actually about 5 inches square but I cut it out round in Photoshop Elements.....kinda cool in a round shape.

If you'd like to check out all the other cool tiles, mosey on over to The Bright Owl and check them out! Thanks a million for stopping by! Your comments are greatly appreciated!  Until next time....

Hugs!

LIM70 - Red, White, & Blue

In honor of the crowning of Queen Elizabeth in 1953, our hosts, Chrissie and Mandi, have chosen red, white, and blue as our colors for this week's color challenge.  On a bright note, since Chrissie remembers the Queen's coronation...that must mean that Chrissie is older than me! LOL!!!  You see...it doesn't take much to make me happy!  I hate to admit it, but...I have serious difficulty using red, white and blue together!  Maybe it's just the brightness of the colors...who knows! Okay, back to my usual...I've made about 5 cards today...none of which make me dance, but they are finished and my brain has shut down for a while.  I think I'll go read a good book when I finish this post!

I believe this first card is self explanatory...just made some chevron strips with some sparkly red and blue paper....added it to my card base, then stamped Congratulations (HA).

For this card, I punched the two smaller stars, then used a star die cut for the larger star from a piece of white textured card stock.  I put a red border on the white piece.  The blue sparkly paper is the same as I used in the first card (and something that has been in my scraps pile for a while!)  I cut a small square of the blue and adhered it to the card base.  Then I pop-dotted the star layer over the top of that...super easy!  Sentiment is from PTI (I think).

I've made a card similar to this one a while back, but it seems to work well for the red, white, and blue theme.  The hot air balloons are from PTI.  Just cut a white layer and a blue layer and sponged in a little light blue for the sky.  Colored the balloons with Copics, then popped them on the card...Fun card!

Can't say that I really like this card or the next one, but I thought I'd post them for you anyway.  I love the sentiment on the card above...but something is wrong with that PTI sentiment...the "L's" in fill, are not complete and always leave a space where the letters should be closed in...I think I got a bad stamp. Does anyone else have that stamp and does your stamp do this? For the butterfly, I just sponged some DI - red and blue on white card stock, then stamped the HA butterfly in black.  I added a touch of liquid pearls, and a bit of glimmer mist.  Sponged the sky with some DI blues, and then added a scored line above and below the sky.

This card was just something random that I came up with.  I had all these butterflies in red punched in my "one day" box (can't remember why I punched them out), so I punched a blue butterfly and just let them all flutter across the card....I drew the little antennas with a marker.

Our beautiful granddaughter got married in April, and I'm scrapping some of the photos I took at the wedding and thought I'd share this one with you.  Pensacola Beach is a beautiful beach with sugar white sand.  We only live about 30 minutes from the beach, but we rarely go out there because of the crowds.  I'm really glad we made it to the wedding...I wouldn't have missed it for the world!

Our granddaughter, Stephanie and new husband, Matt. I used white card stock for the background. A very simple layout so that the focus is totally on the photo. The bird was stamped with a Gina K stamp and colored with Copics. The grass, the two tags, and title work "Breathtaking" were all cut with the Cameo. The birds flying are stamped in soft grey and are a Gina K stamp. I found the netting in some of my "old" stash and cut a strip to ground the photo, then added a string of flat pearls, some robin egg bling, and a few tiny shells. The beads I used in the title are some alphabet beads that I've had in my stash forever...and I strung them on just string and knotted the ends. For the "Breathtaking" part of the title, I cut it out 4 times with the Cameo and layered the letters to give it a chipboard look. Their names and the date of the wedding are hand written with a Memento blue pen. Journaling is tucked behind the photo with the breathtaking tag (designed and cut with the Cameo Silhouette program). Journaling reads: 

Watching the two of you joined your lives together was a special moment for me and your Papa. I'm so glad that we were able to be there for your wedding. I took this photo just minutes after the wedding ceremony was over and the happiness and joy that lights your faces definitely makes this a beautiful breathtaking moment! I love that you chose to go barefooted for your wedding on the beach…how perfect! 

(The blue border is not on the layout, it was added in Photoshop so that the white edges would be visible)

Thanks so much for stopping by!! I truly appreciate the time you take to stop by and leave all your wonderful comments! Until next time...

Hugs!

St. Luke's Charity Card Challenge - Furry Friends

For the month of June, the challenge at St. Luke's Charity Card Challenge is to create a card featuring a "furry" animal.  It seems that I have very few "furry" animal type stamps, but I did have a bunny that will work just fine!

The image is from Flourishes, as is the sentiment.  I stamped the image on white card stock, then colored it with Copics.  I stamped the larger bunny on another piece of white...then colored him and cut him out to pop over the top for a little dimension.  I used a torn edge and some blue DI to sponge in a "sky".  The white piece with the stamping is layered on a dark green then popped over a white card base.  Super simple card!

Thanks so much for stopping by!  If you haven't played along with the St. Luke's Charity Card Challenge before, give it a try...or at least pop over to see all the gorgeous work the ladies have posted there!

Your comments are always appreciated! Until next time....

Hugs!

OLW90 - Dude's Rule

This week the OLW challenge is hosted by Susan at Simplicity.  This week's OLW is to make a one-layer card for a man in your life. According to Susan, it could be a Father's Day card, whatever theme we choose, just need to make it for a guy.  I can do that!

Here's my take on the challenge...and it's only ONE card!  Can you believe it!?

I used a stamp from Gina K Designs...I really LOVE this lighthouse stamp!  The sentiment is from a Flourishes set.  I colored the image with Copics.  Then I punched a 2 inch circle and using the negative shape, I sponged in the yellow "light".  There isn't any water with the image, so I added my own by sponging on several shades of blue DI.  That's all for me today!

Thanks so much for stopping by!  You comments are always appreciated!! Until next time...

Hugs!