Turquoise and Silver... Oh My!!!

Good morning friends, hope all is well with you! I'm so excited about today's post, and card, that I can hardly stand it. eeeeeekkk!! Normally I'd post this tomorrow, but I'll be traveling to my son's for Thanksgiving so I'm posting it a day early.

Several weeks ago I was asked by Jan Hunnicutt to make a card for today's color Midweek Throwdown [MWT] for Operation Write Home's blog Stars & Stamps. For the colors I  chose Turquoise and Silver. I just love the look of these colors together and use them a lot for Christmas... so my sample card is a Christmas card. This is a very Clean and Simple [CAS] design and can be mass produced very easily.

The metallic silver card stock came with the scalloped edges and measures 4 1/4" X 5 1/2"; perfect size for a card front. I made sure I wiped my X-Static embossing pouch all over the card base before I stamped the tree and sentiment in Peacock Feathers Distress Ink.

Normally this ink dries very quickly, but on the somewhat shiny card stock it gave me enough time to sprinkle on clear embossing powder and heat set it. This is why the X-Static pouch is needed. It's filled with a talc like powder and really helps prevent the embossing powder from sticking where you don't want it. In a pinch I've used baby powder but I prefer the embossing pouch. I added a simple ribbon bow and in less than 10 minutes I had a finished card.

Now you know why I'm so excited about this post, and why I want to make sure it gets posted. You see, I don't have the best of luck scheduling posts in blogger :( I'm soooo honored to be asked to make a card and pick the colors for this week's MWT. I love making cards and I'm proud of my work. At times I can be rather anal about my craft because I want it to be the best work I can do. But... for Jan, from OWH, to recognize the work of lil 'ole me and ask me to make a card for their blog..... well that's just to the moon and back awesome!!

Thank You so much for stopping by... hope you enjoyed your visit! And please, if you're traveling like me for Thanksgiving, be careful and watch for the crazies on the road. Card Recipe follows.

Recipe:
Cardstock - Yours Truly Metallic Silver A2 Scallop Note from Archiver's
Stamps - Tree , I've had so long I don't know where it's from. Sorry :(
               Sentiment, Christmas Wishes set by Stampendous
Ink - Tim Holtz Distress Ink, by Ranger, in Peacock Feathers from the Spring Bundle
Clear Embossing Powder and Turquoise ribbon from JoAnn's
heat tool

OWH sketch #147

Good evening peeps! Boy this past week has been crazy, and the last couple of days even crazier. Which, of course, is making me a little crazier than normal. My biggest issue is my car... the key won't come out of the ignition. What??? Yup, my car has so many issues it's one step away from being a whole dang subscription! But enough of that; I have a cute card I want to share that I made for this Sunday's OWH sketch challenge on their blog Stars & Stamps. It also meet the requirements for last Wednesday's Midweek Throwdown Challenge  for thank you cards. Our heroes need thank you cards to send out for the holiday goodies they will get.

Here is the sketch if anyone wants to give this a try.

Normally I would run away, fast, from this sketch because of those tiny strips. You see I usually make a mess of lining up such small pieces of paper. I decided it was time to put my big girl panties on and get over it. I'm glad I did because I'm pleased at how well it turned out. I'll admit to cheating. Yup! I adhered my paper strips to a piece of white card stock making sure the tops and sides were straight. When that was done I adhered the whole piece to my card front and then added the biggest piece of paper. Voila! All those tiny strips are lined up nice and even. I used my new Tonic Studios punch I won recently to make the horizontal strip. The punch is called Doily Strip and Bazzill makes the metallic silver cardstock I used. I'm afraid I can't say who made the patterned paper or snowflake stamps. I've had both for a long time and that was back in the day when I didn't know I should be keeping track of who makes what.

I wasn't quite pleased with this card at first because the white strips of paper [blue snowflakes on a white background] were so stark against the darker paper. The white tag with a computer generated sentiment was too stark as well. I used my Marvy ink pad in Salvia Blue, by Uchida, to add some small snowflakes. I still wasn't satisfied so I sponged some of the ink on the edges, working it into the tag.  Then I softened the edges of the white paper strips the same way. Now I'm satisfied... so much easier on the eyes to look at!

Now it's time to wrap up my ramblings. Thank You so much for stopping by... hope you enjoyed your visit!

CardSwaps & OWH Challenges

Good evening peeps! Today is Veteran's Day and I want to say "Thank You" to all our veterans for your service. Whether you're in active duty or not, whether you are still with us or not, your service to America is greatly appreciated!

Today's also been one of those blaaahh days. You know what I'm talkin about... you know you should be doing 10,000 things and nothing gets done. Well not quite, because I got two, make that three, cards made. This first one of for the Member Challenge over at CardSwaps. Teresa came up with a sketch for us to follow and I really like it a lot.

This next card is for the Midweek Throwdown over at Operation Write Home's blog, Stars & Stamps. I also used a Bonus Sketch that OWH posted a little while ago. Since it's Sunday I'll mention that I'm a Convert. Yep, I used to make a card willy nilly, but then started playing with sketches. I've seen the light and been converted. Now it seems I have a hard time making a card without a sketch. The MWT call was for red, white, and blue on our cards.

I'll put this in my next OWH box as an "Any Hero" card. While I was at it I decided to do one in off white as well. You know what they say about hindsight having 20/20 vision... yeah if I had a do over I'd have distressed the edges with some color. I chose not to use embellishments but I'm not sure that was a good idea.

Recipes:
1) Cardstock - Bazzill red                                       Cardstock - Bazzill red
     DP - red plaid by TPC                                        DP - Glory collection by Authentique Paper
     Embossing - Cuttlebug 'snowflakes' folder         Embossing - Cuttlebug 'A2 stars' folder
     Image - don't know                                              Image - Not Forgotten set by Our Daily Bread
     Copics - BG10, R29, E25, Y38, C1
     Ink - Tuxedo Black by Momento for both cards
     Printed ribbon and bakers twine

Well peeps, I'm callin it a night. I'm going to take this tired 'ole body to my easy chair for some TV time. As always, Thank You for stopping by and I hope you enjoyed your visit!

CardSwaps Challenge, OWH Sketch, and Pinterest Make For Strange Bedfellows!

Blessed Sunday my friends! I know this is a long post title, but it fits this card to a T! The challenge at CardSwaps last Monday was to have a wreath on your card. I so wanted to make a punch art wreath with branches, or snowflakes, or leaves... all attempts were fails. I should clarify and say 3 days of fails! :(   Then I saw a card on Pinterest with the cutest, and simplest, wreath. I eagerly abandoned my punch art fails and made the Pinterest wreath. Seriously, this wreath took all of about 10 minutes start to finish. Operation Write Home's weekly sketch 145 came out this morning on their blog Stars & Stamps. An A-HAH moment and it all fell into place.

I really, really like how it turned out. I was able to take a concept from Pinterest, modify it slightly, and make a card that fills the CardSwaps challenge and the OWH sketch challenge. It was quite easy to put together and would make a great kit card. Oh... and there isn't any stamping involved. Last year I found Rub-On sets by The Paper Company. It's an outside - inside set meaning the Merry Christmas is the front, or outside sentiment. The inside sentiment reads Wishing you peace, joy and happiness. Actually, I assigned Merry Christmas to the front because it fit with the sketch. Whichever way you use the sentiments it reads very well, so I don't think it matters.

For the wreath I punched the center circle first then centered the larger punch over it and punched. For the banner I used the 3/4" square punch, at an angle, to make the fishtail ends.

Ooops! I had to come back and add something. Don't ya hate when that happens? Here is the sketch we are to follow at OWH:

Supplies:
Card Stock: Bazzill red, white, green
Embossing folder - SU Petals A Plenty
Punches: 2 1/2" scallop circle(Marvy Uchida)
               1 1/8" plain circle (not sure)
               3/4" square punch (Creative Memories or CM)
               Small heart border punch, EKSuccess... I think.
Sentiment: The Paper Co (TPC) rub-on set Merry Christmas Multiples
Ink: Ranger Distress Ink in Festive Berries
Poinsettia & Leaf: Hero Arts felt embellishments
Liquid Pearls: White Opal

Thank You so much for stopping by, hope you enjoyed your visit!