Thank You For The Beautiful Ways You Touch My Life

 

Time Out Challenge #182 begins today. It is our 7th Birthday celebration! Can you believe it?? Our challenge runs from Thursday, Feb 25, 2021 to March 10, 2021. Our wonderful sponsor is STAMPlorations. Challenge winner will receive a $40.00 gift voucher for the STAMPlorations store.

Our Guest Designer this week is Karen of Random Reflections. Karen is a crafter and photographer and her work is very colorful and often in a CAS style. Treat yourself to a visit to her wonderful blog, and show her some love. You will be full of inspiration after your visit.

To create my card, I used the Shower of Flutters ARTplorations Stencil and applied Distress Oxide ink all around it. I spattered the panel with Heidi Swapp's Gold Color Shine. I then added the sentiment from STAMPlorations Beautiful You stamp set. I die cut the inked panel with Spellbinders Hemstitch Rectangle Dies and mounted it on a black card base. Although the sentiment is not a birthday one, it reflects how meaningful it is to me to belong to this design team, and especially to thank Sandie Munro for inviting me to join years ago. She quickly became a very dear friend, and for so many reasons, I am so pleased and proud to be a part of this design team.

Please hop on over to the Time Out Challenge Blog to see the wonderful creations that Karen and the Design Team came up with to inspire you. Come play with us!

I'm also playing at:

Watercooler Wednesday #310 - All about Occasions

Krafty Chicks Challenge #548 - All Occasions

Sisterhood Of Crafters - Anything Goes

Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge - Anything Goes

You Are Loved

 

Today, I watched THIS video by Jennifer McGuire, and immediately wanted to try this technique. It uses sanding blocks, and I actually had SU sanding blocks in my stash that have not seen the light of day for at least 10 years! Oh happy day! Here's to hoarding supplies... and I have about a million embossing folders. I am so glad to see EFs having a bit of a renaissance in the craft world these days. Since I still have Valentine stuff all over the place, I chose to try this with my Sizzix 3-D textured Impressions Hearts embossing folder.

I applied and blended 3 shades of Pink Distress Oxide Inks from dark to light onto Neenah Solar white 110# card stock. (next time I will use more contrasting colors). I ran the embossing folder through my die cut machine, then sanded the raised areas with the sanding block. The SSS You Are Loved Word and Shadow Die Set was already foiled and assembled and in my snippet box waiting to be used. I popped it up with foam tape and adhered it to my background. Done!

I just love the way this turned out, and of course, I went shopping afterwards from Jennifer's supply list, as I really loved doing this. Of course, I bought more embossing folders. Oy! It all started with a visit to one of my favorite crafty friends, and her wonderful card made for Let's Squash It, though she did not use this technique. The rest is shopping history. Tee hee hee.

I'm playing at:

Let's Squash It #5 - Use a Love Themed EF and the Color Red/Pink

Day Of The Month Card Club #24 - Valentine's Day

Double D Challenges - Anything With a Heart

Flowers For My Friend

 

We continue the celebration of our 10th birthday (month) at Less Is More, so we need some flowers to along with our chocolates from our first 10th birthday challenge. This one is a love-it-or-hate-it One Layer Card.

Big celebrations with lots of sponsors. Click HERE for details. 

Please head over to the Less Is More Blog and see what the Design Team has created for your inspiration. I hope you'll play along with us to share your creations and for a chance to win. Remember to keep your design Clean And Simple.

To be eligible for showCASe and PRIZE WINNER choices you will need to carefully follow the guidance on our GLOSSARY OF TERMS and our HOW TO PLAY pages. Your design should feature lots of clean / white / blank / non patterned / non textured space. All challenge details are on the Less Is More blog. Good Luck!

I'm also playing at:

Krafty Chicks #547 - CAS

Life Is A Blank Canvas

It's time for a new challenge at Festive Friday where every challenge is an inspiration list based on a selected holiday/festivity from the traditional to the unusual. Challenge projects must include at least three items from the festivity inspiration list.

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Since the Inspiration List is a mix of elements related to the festivity, the creator has the choice to make something for that festivity, or to ignore the festivity all together and create something using just the three (or more) elements selected.

Today's festivities are in celebration of International Women's Day, which is celebrated on March 8th. The challenge runs from February 19 - March 1.

For my Women-themed project, I used: heart, girls/women, lipstick. I really wanted to push myself to do something out of my comfort zone for this one - and also something loving and encouraging. I decided to make a card with a mixed media collage design. I recently bought a wonderful array of stamps and stencils from Funky Fossil Designs. I used a gel press panel that I created a while ago for my background and built on the design from there. I am super pleased with the way it came out.

Supplies Used:

Stamps~Funky Fossil Designs Musings, Lotus Reflections, She Is Fierce. STAMPlorations Scribbly Splattery Grunge. Essentials By Ellen All Inside by Julie Ebersole.

Accessories~Spellbinders Hemstitch Rectangle Dies

For more inspiration, be sure to visit the rest of the Festive Friday Challenge Design team.

Ann Schach

Beth McCullough

Sharon Hashimoto Burkert

Melanie Hungerford

Helen Jennings

Melva Peters

Judy Rozema

I'm also playing at:

Double D Challenges - Anything with a heart

Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge - Add Some Texture

For My Love

Time Out Challenge #181 begins today.  We are challenged to create a card inspired by the photo below.

 Our wonderful sponsor for this challenge is: 

Our Guest Designer this week is  Nancy of Nancy's Creative Mess. Nancy is a very talented crafter who often creates in a CAS style. Treat yourself to a visit to her wonderful blog, and show her some love.

To create my card, I used CAS-ual Fridays Heart Board Dies to cut several nesting hearts in shades of red and pink. I had these little rolled flowers in my snippet box for ages that look like the candied flowers on the cookies in the photo. I added them along with some stamped and die cut leaves from Altenew's Wings of Hope stamp and die sets. I popped the hears up with fun foam, and adhered them to the white panel debossed with Altenew's Doted Swirls Debossing Cover Die. The red card base is from Gina K. The sentiment is from CAS-ual Fridays Love Notes stamp set (retired). 

Please hop on over to the Time Out Challenge Blog to see the wonderful creations that Nancy and the Design Team came up with to inspire you. Come play with us!

I'm also playing at:

Watercooler Wednesday #308 - All About Occasions

Day Of The Month Card Club #24 - Valentines

Always Fun #200 - Romantic/Love

Just Us Girls #570 - Valentine

Inkspirational #232 - Hearts

Moving Along With The Times #127 - Valentines/Love

Double D Challenges - Valentine Love

You Are Loved

 

I wanted to use this gnome and large die cut sentiment together. I could not find a way to like whatever I tried on an A2 sized card. I am not so comfortable with the slimline craze, but when I laid this out, and added the stenciled hearts with the delicious new Distress Oxide color - Kitsch Flamingo, it made me very happy. The pink background behind the die cut sentiment is pink vellum. The DO ink, SSS Gnome dies & sentiment dies are "Never Before Used Schtuff"!

I'm playing at:

Color Hues #11 - Red & Pink

Watercooler Wednesday #308 - All About Occasions

Alphabet Challenge - V is for Vellum

Pink vellum behind sentiment die cu

Mod Squad Challenge - All About Love 

NBUS #23

Bright & Brilliant

 

Big news at Less Is More. It's our 10th Anniversary! Can you believe it?? Challenge #436 is all about celebrating our anniversary with colors of chocolate.

Lots of scope - milk chocolate, dark chocolate, or add in another colour e.g. mint chocolate, chocolate caramel, chocolate strawberry cream etc, etc,  (But make sure that the main colour is chocolate with a 'hint' of any other color you use) You could even make your image a box of chocs or a bar of choc. Just get creative ;-)

We are joined by Mandi and Chrissie, co-founders of this awesome challenge. Be sure to stop by the Less Is More blog to read their stories and comments. There are many wonderful and generous sponsors to help us celebrate.

I am forever grateful for the gift of being part of this design team. When the challenge first started, I was not a CAS designer. I had so much to learn, and made many a blunder along the way. Fast forward 10 years, and CAS is now my preferred style, even though I dabble in others here and there. I am so pleased and proud to be a part of this team. What a wonderful group of crafters and lovely people.

The card I have inserted at the top of this post is not the original. I have amended this post to tell a story. The card below is the card that was originally at the top. Turns out that I confused the start date of this challenge and thought it was next week on February 13. I realized my mistake less than 24 hours before the challenge would go live and long after it was due on the Design Team Blog. I did not want to miss our big BD challenge, so I hurried to make a card as soon as possible. In my haste, I focused on Birthday and Chocolate, but not the fact that it is a COLOR challenge. I did not read the directions carefully. I am a teacher. I complain about students and parents doing this often, and here I did it myself!!! So though this is a chocolate cake, that is the only chocolate colored thing on it. I love the card, but had to make a new, more chocolate colored one! That is the one at the top of this post. I crack myself up sometimes...

To create my cards, I debuted my "never before used" Reverse Confetti stamps and dies for my chocolate birthday cake. I colored the one up top with Copics, and I watercolored the second. I used a sentiment from Winnie & Walter's Sentimental: Birthday, and the Birthday Circle stencil from Brutus Monroe on the second card. Vintage Sepia ink on the top, black on #2.

Please head over to the Less Is More Blog and see what Mandi & Chrissie and the Design Team have created for your inspiration. I hope you'll play along with us to share your creations and for a chance to win. Remember to keep your design Clean And Simple.

To be eligible for showCASe and PRIZE WINNER choices you will need to carefully follow the guidance on our GLOSSARY OF TERMS and our HOW TO PLAY pages. Your design should feature lots of clean / white / blank / non patterned / non textured space. All challenge details are on the Less Is More blog. Good Luck!

I'm also playing at:

NBUS #23