Dance, Sing, and Live

This card was made for the VLV September week 1 sketch challenge.  It took me a while to figure out how I wanted to approach this card.   Here is the sketch and the inspiration room I chose.
  

                                      

 Now, when you see my card, you may be wondering how it relates back to the inspiration room.  I was attracted to the colored polka dots in the rug and the colors in the love wall hanging (pink, turquoise, green, and black).  The heart paper relates to the hands shaped to form a heart in the picture collage on the right side of the inspiration photo.  The third dp is a little more of a stretch, but I thought the colors in it related well to the scheme I'd chosen. 

I used Basic Grey "Olivia" papers for the various panels and matted all of them.  All of the stamps I used are from Verve.  The text is from "Beautiful You" and the flower and leaves are from the new set "Dream Big."  I stamped the medium flower in the set in SU! Real Red and cut it out.  Then I stamped the smallest flower twice, and cut them out and layered them.  I slightly off set the second one so that it would give the flower the look of more layers.  They are raised on dimensionals.  I stamped the leaves in SU! Old Olive and stamped a second time without reinking (slightly off set) to give more dimension.  I used a button from my stash for the flower's center.  I took a close up so you could see it more clearly. 

I cut off the shank of the button and just glued it in place.  Then I just added 2 little roses and called it done!

Thanks for stopping by!  Have a great day!
Sarah

Edited to add:  I forgot to mention that this card also qualified in the Verve project parade to use something old and something new. 

Amazing Grace

I wanted to play along in the current Our Daily Bread Designs challenge (ODBDSLC26) to use punches or dies.  After much deliberation, I finally decided to use ODBD "Amazing Grace Hymn" as the featured sentiment. 

I had to photograph this in the evening, and without a light tent, I apologize that the colors are a little off in the photo.  I used Basic Grey "Porcelain" paper for the background.  I stamped the panel and hand cut both of the Nestabilities panels (does that still count as using a die?).  This card is 6" square, and to get the entire hymn included, I would have needed to use the largest die and there was a lot of white border space and it barely fit on the card front (without a mat underneath).  So then I thought I'd trace the outer edge of the second largest Nestie and hand cut the sentiment panel.  I lightly sponged the edges of the sentiment panel with SU! Certainly Celery.  I mounted the panel on the olive mat and just hand trimmed a mat border that's approximately 1/8".  There's a little MS punched border behind the panel and then I just added some roses to the bottom.  There are MS leaf punches behind the biggest roses.  I tried to fit in a silk ribbon bow in the center, but it was just too much and overwhelming.  (At least I have a white silk bow tied and ready to go at a moment's notice!)

Here is a detail shot of the roses. 

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!
Sarah

Edited to add:  This card was chosen to receive a "Shining the Light" badge.  It made my day!

A Warm Hello

Today I made a card based on this week's Mojo Monday sketch.

The flowers are from the new Verve set "Dream Big" and stamped with SU! Melon Mambo. The leaves were stamped in SU! Wild Wasabi.  I stamped the leaves and then stamped them again slightly offset without reinking in between stamping to produce the lighter leaf image.  The flower centers (from Verve's "Budding Blossoms") were stamped, colored with Copics, cut out, and mounted on dimensionals.  The sentiment is from the new Verve set "Happy Hello."  The dp is by My Mind's Eye.  I added some black satin ribbon, a little button with some floss, and pearls to complete the sketch.  The finished card is 6" square.

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!
Sarah

Wanted!

I was going to post this card earlier today, but I decided to play with the background of my blog instead.  I'm pretty happy with how it turned out, but it took me a looooong time to accomplish what many of you would have been able to do in just mere seconds.  I'm learning though!

I made a card for Jen's Sketch for You to Try (SFYTT #43) from this past Saturday.  It was the perfect layout to use up some last bits of the SU! paper that coordinated with the Wanted and Bronc Buster sets. 

I used the sketch as it was, no flipping or rotating for me this time.

Here is my card, an A2 this time.

I used the SU! Weathered background stamp and then just cut my scraps to fit the dimensions.  I used a distressing tool on the edges of all of the papers and mats to make it look more rugged and masculine.  The edges of the wanted panel are sponged with Vintage Photo distress ink.  I added some gold star brads to the top for the 3 dots in the sketch and tied a bit of twine to make an embellishment where the heart was shown in the sketch. 

I left the inside blank so it could be just a masculine card in my stash (wanted - for you to get well; wanted - to wish you a happy birthday, wanted - for you to be home safely soon, etc.).

Thanks for stopping by!  Enjoy your evening!
Sarah

"The Delicate Cottage Rose"

I discovered a new (to me) challenge at a blog called The Shabby Tea Room this weekend.  Just take a look at this gorgeous inspiration room!  Wow!  If anyone hadn't already noticed from my use of flowers on nearly every card I make, I have a passion for flowers.  My favorites are pink roses and stargazer lilies. 

So I set out to try to make a shabby chic card worthy of this inspiration room.  At first I thought I'd use a dp background that would imitate the wallpaper in the picture, but then I remembered that I wanted to try a scored background card sometime.  There have been lots of beautiful cards that I've seen that use this really easy technique, and if anyone is not familiar, there is a great tutorial with lots of pictures on how to execute this technique at the Our Daily Bread Designs blog. 

So, here's my card for the challenge.

I scored my center panel at 1/2" intervals.  The center panel is 5" square and the finished card is 6" square.  I added various mats that are 1/16" in width to provide some depth.  I decided to use pearls rather than rhinestones as I wanted the card to be more serene.  I took the strips of pearls I found at Michael's, cut them apart so I had individual pieces rather than a long strip, and placed the smallest pearls on all of the scoring mark intersections using tweezers.  I placed the flowers first and then added the pearls, so the pearls are not all the way under the flowers.  I used medium sized pearls for the sides.  I think it helps to frame the panel.

The sentiment is part of the new Verve release, a Plain Jane called "Psalm 46:1."  I really like this verse as it is so versatile and could be used for get well, thinking of you, or sympathy cards.  The font is also very pleasing to the eye.  I stamped the image in Versafine Onyx Black.  I recently discovered this ink and love it for sentiments.  It gives a crisp outline even for finely detailed stamps.  Then I used Nestabilites to cut out the 2 panels and embossed them.  On the inner panel, while the die was still around my panel, I sponged the edges with SU! Pretty in Pink.  The inner panel is directly adhered to the larger one.  I mounted the larger panel on foam tape.

Then the final touches were of course some roses!  I just found some new flowers at Michael's on Friday.  They had tins of these gorgeous large pink and white roses that are a new item.  The leaves are punched with my MS leaf punch and inked with Vintage Photo distress ink.  I used to just leave my leaves uninked, but I have found that the addition of the brown ink really lends a more realistic appearance to the leaves.  The biggest leaf came in the package with the new roses, and it already had the brown edges.

Finally, I'd like to say thank you to everyone who has stopped by my blog over my first two weeks of blogging and left such kind comments.  Also, a huge thank you to those of you who have signed up to be followers!  I hope you'll continue to enjoy my creations.

Have a blessed Sunday!  Thanks for visiting!
Sarah

Stamping in Time with a Bird

I made this card for the Our Daily Bread Designs Stamping in Time Challenge.  The challenge was to use a bird image on the card.  I only have a few ODBD stamps (so far!), and unfortunately, I don't have any of their beautiful bird sets.  The rules allowed us to use a non-ODBD bird if needed, so I used the bird from the Stampin' Up! set "Carte Postale" along with a sentiment from ODBD "With Heartfelt Sympathy." 

I followed the sketch for this week's Cute Card Thursday challenge, but I turned the sketch on its side.  The dark papers are from K & Co. and the pink strip is from the DCVW "Luxury Stack."   I added Primas and MS punched leaves that were heavily inked with Vintage Photo distress ink.  The final touches were pearls and burgundy 1.25" May Arts silk ribbon that was tied with a Bow Easy.

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!
Sarah

Beautiful You

Today is VLV day week 4 for August.  Here's the sketch we had to play with and the inspiration photo I chose.  This week Amber chose inspiration photos from The Pottery Barn.

I found some older K & Co. dp that was a great match to the bedding shown in the photo.  Based on the sketch, I knew I wouldn't have a really large space for an image, so I decided to stamp Beautiful You from the Verve set "Beautiful You" and then fill the rest of the space with embellishments.

I thought I'd try to do a more shabby chic approach on this card.  The finished card is 6" square.  I distressed the edges of all of the dp and the matting papers and also did some zig zagging with my sewing machine.  I opted for a wider zig zag on the red paisley base panel and a narrower zig zag for the middle and top layers.  I strayed from the sketch a bit with the 3 dots.  I laid out different kinds of flowers and I really wanted a ribbon, so I was just about to adhere the 2 flowers and ribbon and it still just didn't look quite right.  I thought what it needed was either some lace or a punched border edge, so I added a strip made with a MS punch and used Vintage Photo distress ink on the edges.  Then I added the 2 Prima cameo roses and the 1.25" white May Arts silk ribbon tied with a Bow Easy. 

I really like this white ribbon.  It's not a stark white, and I've found I can use it with both white paper as well as a light ivory paper as I did on this card.  For reference, the mats behind the dp are the light ivory paper and the MS punched strip was done on white paper.  I didn't ink the center of that strip, so I think you can see how nicely it works with both of those colors.  I'd ordered some of the ivory May Arts silk ribbon as well, but that particular ivory is (to me) a darker ivory, what I'd call champagne.  I auditioned an ivory silk ribbon on this card, but that bow will just have to wait for another day to be used as I thought it was just too dark for this card.

I had a bit of a panic situation while making this card this morning.  I went to grab the ribbon out of my ribbon drawer, and it was gone.  I'd just picked up my work space pretty well yesterday, so I couldn't figure out how I'd managed to not put my favorite ribbon back in its proper place.  I hunted and hunted through my other ribbons.  I finally took all of the ribbons out and sorted them - no white silk.  Ugh.  I'd just ordered 10 yards of this ribbon and haven't used very much of it yet.  Finally, an hour later, I realized that I had put it out on the guest bed (adjacent to my craft space) with the scraps of BG "Capella" papers that I'd been using earlier in the week so that all of those supplies would be together and ready to go for a future project.  Whew!  Well, I guess the good part of all of this is that my ribbon drawer is now neatly organized with ribbons wrapped up on the spools again.  That is definitely a job I would not have tackled anytime soon had it not been for my "missing" silk ribbon. 

If you have never participated in the VLV challenges over on SCS, I highly recommend trying them.  If you complete all of the monthly challenges, you'll be entered to win a prize the following month.  I was the lucky winner for July 2010 in the random drawing, and my prize is the entire new release of Verve stamps coming out tonight!  I can't wait for them to arrive after seeing all of the great sneak peaks by the Verve Divas this last week.

Enjoy your day and thanks for stopping by!
Sarah