Winter Sympathy

The weather is changing and the mornings are getting frosty. I love this time of year!

The Feels Like Frost Designer Series Paper has some beautiful realistic scenes of frosty fields and winter landscapes and perfectly captures the feeling of the cooler months here in Canada. My card features that patterned paper for the sketch challenge at the As You See It Challenge Blog.

I also used the Brick and Mortar Embossing Folder on Whisper White cardstock on this card over a Basic Grey card base. The sentiment is from the Woven Heirloom stamp set from Stampin’ Up!, but I inked it in sections with a bit of Just Jade, Misty Moonlight, and Highland Heather ink, to coordinate with the beautiful patterned paper.

I stamped the sentiment on Whisper White cardstock and die-cut it with one of the dies from the Stitched So Sweetly Dies.

The card is completed with the Pool Party Sheer Ribbon and some Basic Pearls.

This sketch is worth trying for yourself. Go ahead and make a card and share it with us at the As You See It Challenge Blog. We love to see where your creativity takes you!

The Beauty of Friendship

I love speed challenges! They get my creative mojo flowing AND I get a card completed lickety-split!

This card came together in my mind really easily. Let me tell you, these used to be REALLY hard for me! The more I do them, the easier they seem to be. It’s such a great creative exercise. I highly recommend you give a speed challenge a try. If you don’t know how it works, you basically think about the card you want to make. Once you have a plan, you can gather your supplies together, but you CANNOT pre-cut any of your paper or ribbon before you start the clock. When you DO start the clock, you move with confidence until your card is complete. Stop the clock and record your time!

Sometimes, the finished product is a little bit lacking, but you will ALWAYS find that your creative brain has jumped into high gear and something about the card you made has inspired you to try it another way. I love how a speed challenge gets my creative mojo flowing freely!

The As You See It Challenge this time, is a Speed Stamping Challenge with a butterfly theme! You can check out what other people created for this challenge and also share your own design with us over at the As You See It Challenge blog.

I borrowed the Beauty Abounds stamp set from a friend for this challenge because I don’t have ANY butterfly stamps! Can you believe it!!?

I stamped the sentiment on the Whisper White cardstock with Tuxedo Black Momento ink, then stamped the bokeh circles with Balmy Blue ink and Granny Apple Green ink. The butterfly images were stamped with Versamark Ink, Gold Embossing Powder was applied and heat set with my Heat Tool.

I added a second layer of Whisper White behind this piece, partly to create a stiffer layer, but also to give a subtle layered look with the white on white edges.

Linen Thread was wrapped around the white layers and tied in a bow before attaching it to the Artistry Blooms Designer Series Paper and Crumb Cake cardstock card base with Stampin’ Dimensionals.

You can check out the video of this card that only took 9 minutes and 3 seconds to make. In our busy world, even 9 minutes can feel like a long time, so I sped the video up for you! LOL! You’re welcome!

Stitched Plaid

I am LOVIN’ the Plaid Tidings Designer Series Paper lately! I’ve been using it a lot and just keep getting ideas to use it even more! Maybe it’s because the weather is getting cooler and I’m inspired by the autumn air.

Over at the As You See It Challenge Blog, we have a theme challenge for you today!

You could use stamps or die cuts that feature sewing, use die-cuts that have a stitched edge, maybe even put some fabric on your card or lay out paper in a quilting pattern. So many options!

What came immediately to my mind when I saw the theme, though, was doing some actual sewing on my card. I love the look of dies with the stitched edges, but nothing looks quite as cool as real, live, 3D stitching with thread. I don’t do it often because it’s not always convenient to pull out my sewing machine, bu-uut … it just so happened that I’d been doing a bit of sewing lately and my machine was already out!

I used a Crumb Cake card base with a strip of one of the plaid patterns from the Plaid Tidings Designer Series Paper glued on the bottom. The rounded corners were created using the Detailed Trio Punch. I cut a rectangle from a different pattern of plaid paper and stitched with white thread around the edges with my sewing machine. Then I distressed the edges of that piece, stamped the thank you sentiment from the Beautiful Autumn stamp set on the bottom right corner in Rich Razzleberry Classic Ink and adhered it to my card base.

The Beautiful Autumn stamp set is available in the Beautiful Autumn Bundle with the Autumn Punch Pack. Buying them together saves you 10%, so of course I chose to save money by getting the bundle! I used one of the leaf punches and punched three leaves from different cardstock colours: Rich Razzleberry, Bumblebee, and Cajun Craze. Each leaf was adhered to a 1″ square of Sahara Sand cardstock and was stitched through the center with my sewing machine. A bit finicky to do with such a small square of paper, but definitely do-able!

Those little squares were then glued, a bit askew, to some 1-1/4″ Whisper White cardstock squares and adhered to the card with Mini Stampin’ Dimensionals.

The final touch was to add some Artistry Blooms Sequins.

I officially LOVE this card and, since my sewing machine is all ready to go, will make a few more!