Christmas Blessings

My creation today is born of inspiration from 3 challenges:

Play Date Cafe #97

The Color Splash!

 Simply create something in Black and then add just a splash of color

THIS WEEK IT'S A SPLASH OF RED!!!!

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CAS-ual Fridays #18

In honor of International Literacy Day on September 8th,

the Girl Fridays have a special challenge involving papercrafting and books.

CFC18: Create a Clean And Simple project inspired by a book, and use the colors black, white and red.

I am a school librarian and I love to be surrounded by books, to share them with my students, and to read the the little ones.  My creation is inspired by the book The Littlest Christmas Tree : a Tale of Growing and Becoming by Janine Jasin. In this story, a small seedling pine wants very much to grow tall enough to become a real Christmas tree, but while she waits, she learns to appreciate the world around her and the value of being her very best right where she is planted.  It's one of my favorites!

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Less Is More #31

A colour themed challenge once more and this time it is:

METALLIC

Make CLEAN & SIMPLE cards with something that has a METALLIC finish to it... ink, embossing, card, charms, actual metal...

I have owned this Krylon Silver Leafing Pen for quite a while and never used it.  This was my perfect opportunity to break it out.  I used it to edge the while panel with the Christmas tree image on it.  It is a beautiful silver finish.  It does not show up well in the photos, but it is very bright and shiny.

Thank you for coming by. As always, I appreciate your wonderful comments so very much! Have a great week!

Supplies:

Paper~PTI white, Gina K black

Stamps~Penny Black Starlit, PTI Signature Christmas

Ink~VersaFine Onyx Black, PTI Fresh Snow.

Accessories~Kaiser Rhinestones, Sizzix/SU Petals-A-Plenty EF, Ellen Hutson red satin ribbon, Krylon Silver Leafing Pen, Dimensionals.

Across the Miles

This card is going to a far away friend, in a far away place, along with a special package. (Don't peek Jenny!)  Today is my last day before starting back to work after a wonderful summer off.  If it weren't for Irene, I would be at work right now!  I guess I have to thank her for that at least...

For this creation, I used a combination of 3 challenges for inspiration, and I am really pleased with the results. My first inspiration was:

CAS-ual Fridays challenge this week is to : Use Stickers in your Clean And Simple design. rub-ons are fine too if you don't have stickers. This was no easy task for me at first. Stickers?  I don't use them on cards, only memory book pages.  You would crack up if you saw the monstrosity I created for my first try. Then I remembered that I had this gorgeous paper with coordinating stickers from Pink Paislee's Butterfly Garden Collection.  For my layout, I went with this week's wonderful sketch from the Clean & Simple blog : FTL155.

Finally, this week's Flutter By Wednesday #FBW168 is an open challenge! Anything goes as long as you have a butterfly, fairy or angel on your creation!!  My butterfly sticker creation certainly fits the bill there.  I love the way these three challenges inspired this creation.  I am grateful for all of the work that goes into these challenge blogs, and so inspired by the work I see.

Supplies:
Stamps - Pink Paislee Butterfly Garden Collection, PTI Everything Button Bits.
Ink - VersaMark, PTI Fresh Snow.
Paper - Kraft, Cajun Craze, White, Always Artichoke, Pink Paislee Butterfly Collection DP.
Accessories - Pink Paislee Butterfly Collection stickers, PTI Double-Ended Banners die, PTI Mehndi Medallion Impression Plate, white embossing powder.

Thank you for stopping in. Have a wonderful day!

Tuesday Trigger Invitation

I live in Northeastern US in NJ, about 40 miles from the coast.  Irene has been here and gone.  It was quite nerve wracking awiting her arrival.  We were very lucky to have had no damage, and we kept our power.  My beloved shoreline is devastated though.  I hope to be able to get to the shore tomorrow.  In the meantime, the winds are still high, so we have to wait to put our deck back in order.  Until then I am getting some crafting in before I return to work on  Tuesday.   I have been very inspired lately by the Moxie Fab World blog hosted by Cath Edvalson.  I decided to play the Tuesday Trigger : Girly & Gutsy challenge, which closes today. Here is the inspiration photo:

Isn't it just fab?? When I saw this, PTI's new Table Service set immediately came to mind.  I love these colors, and I enjoyed putting this card together.  For the background, I CASE'd an idea from THIS post on Nichole Heady's blog. I stamped the Chrysanthemum from PTI's Year of Flowers Collection on white card stock, then I outlined the flowers with a C1 Copic marker.  I love the way this looks. 

I am going to try to do at least one more challenge today.  I hope wherever you are, so are safe and dry and enjoying this day.  Thank you for stopping by.

Peaceful Soul

Week 28 - One Layer with a special feature.  USE INK

** This does include ink pads **

...hopefully in a way you haven't tried before.... or using a favourite technique.

Well I have to say I am so excited about this creation.  Mandi & Chrissie - thank you for making me do things I would not have done!  I {{{heart}}} LIM challenges. 

I recently made a couple of cards with an inking technique that I have never used before. Then lo and behold, this week's LIM challenge was to make a one layer card and use an inking technique that you may not have tried before.  I felt compelled to do something different, so I looked to my Ranger distress inks that I have barely used.  I really had no idea what to do with them., so I viewed a couple of Tim Holtz videos on You Tube and I was off.  I have to say that I think this is my favorite card I ever made.  I masked a one inch border on my vanilla cardstock. I then used various Ranger distress inks with a blending tool and covered the open rectangle. I spritzed with water and dried it with a heat gun. I added Glimmer Mist for shine, then stamped the triple tree image from PTI's Through The Trees.  I finished it off with a sentiment from PTI's Peaceful Garden.

I love the way this card turned out. I am thankful to Mandi and Chrissie for making me do this! Thank you for visiting my blog today. I siwh you a peaceful day!

CR84FN35 Thank You

 This is my take on CR84FN35 - Lavender, Celery and Gray.

I have fallen in love with the Acrylic Block Stamping technique.  You can read more about it HERE.  The base of my card is Basic Gray.  I scribbled with an Old Olive watercolor crayon on an acrylic block, misted it, and pressed it on to watercolor paper. I then stamped the butterfly image from PTI's Happy Trails on the matching die cut with Lavender Lace ink, added some tiny self adhesive pearls, and adhered it with Dimensionals.  I sprayed the watercolor paper with Iridescent Gold Glimmer Mist for some sheen.  The sentiment from PTI's Signature Greetings is stamped with Versa Fine Onyx Black. Simple as that! I really like the way this turned out.  Thanks for stopping in and thank you for your wonderful comments.

Peaceful Wishes

This week it's time for another colour challenge over at the Simply Less Is More Challenge Blog.  Chrissie and Mandi have decided to ask us to make a card using the

COLOURS

of

OUR NATION'S FLAG!

I live in the USA, and our flag colors are Red, White and Blue.  I always check the LIM challenge the first moment I can get on my computer each Saturday.  I thought a lot about what I would do with this challenge, but I did not have time until this morning to do anything with my thoughts.  Very early in the day today, I saw THIS post from Susan Raihala of Simplicity. Susan's work always moves me. I wish I could see things through her eyes.  Susan used the Acrylic Block Stamping technique in her creation today - one I have never seen before. When I viewed Susan's creation with this technique, I immediately knew what I would do for the LIM challenge.  My card is a CASE of Susan's, but it has it's own character.  After trying this technique several times on white card stock, I decided I needed to use water color paper and I loved the results.  I am so pleased with this creation. I really love it, and I know I will use this technique again and again. Thank you so much for coming to view!

Summer Fruity Drink

It's Summertime, and the living is easy peasy lemon squeezy! My creation today is for 3 challenges -

FEELING FRUITY

Create using fruit on your cards or fruit colours...

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SUMMER FUN SOMETHING

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FOOD & DRINK

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I really love this Impression Obsession image - Sweet Lemonade.  It's so summery, fruity, lovey dovey, and PERFECT for these 3 challenges!  So I got to work stamping it with Memento Tuxedo Black and coloring it with Copics.  I cut it out with Nesties and  mounted it on black and Melon Mambo.  Not much more was needed with this combination, so I just decided to emboss white card stock with PTI's Sunshine Impression Plate for the base of my card.  I tried all kinds of placements for the sentiment, which is from Wilson Designs' Teeny Bikini.  Nothing looked right.  This image really stands on its own, so I took the plunge and stamped it right on the image panel.  I am so glad I did that. My eye was pleased! I need a glass on lemonade now...  Thank you for visiting my blog!  I always appreciate your wonderful comments.