CAS Colour and Sketches 277 Serene Dove

Hi again, everyone!  It's my third week as a guest designer at the Clean and Simple Colours & Sketches challenge!  It's time for another color challenge, and here is your palette:

I had a few different ideas for these colors, and I actually made two cards, I'll share this one first!  I used some of the new Graceful Glass vellum to create a "stained glass window" using a Basic Black frame and Blend markers in the challenge colors:

I normally color just the back of the vellum, but to intensify the colors, I colored both the front and the back!  It was easy to do as the alcohol inks dry very quickly!  I stamped the dove from Serene Garden and diecut it out:

then stamped a sentiment from Rooted in Nature below the panel:

I felt this would be a lovely sympathy card; although they're never fun to make, it's always good to have some on hand.  And here's another card I created using these colors; this one is very clean and simple, almost a little too clean for me!  I felt like these colors were beachy, so I created an ocean by watercoloring a line of Pool Party ink and filling in below it; I stamped the sentiment from Sitting Here in Bermuda Bay, then stamped the deck chair from Colorful Seasons in Calypso Coral and fussy-cut it out:

I also hand-painted a couple of seagulls to make the sky look a little less bleak!  My dilemma, besides the fact that it is so bare, is that when using SU's watercolor paper, I never know which neutral to use....Whisper White is too white and Very Vanilla is not white enough!  At any rate, I chose Very Vanilla for my card base and called it a day!

I hope you'll play with our pretty challenge colors this week...be sure to check out the CAS Colours & Sketches blog to see what the other designers created, and add your creation too!

My niece came over one afternoon last week with her daughters who are two and three years old; they were enamored with John and didn't really care that our swing set and sand box are rather old and rickety!!

Enjoy your day and be blessed!

AYSI173 Just Sitting Here

Happy Friday, peeps!  It's time for another As You See It challenge; this week it's a sketch, with lots of room for interpretation:

First, before I share my card, I must confess that I CASEd this idea from Loll at  CAS Watercolour Challenge!  Their challenge this month is "bird", and I just loved her card with the little bird diecut against that beautiful watercolored background!

 I thought it would work well with our sketch challenge, so I just had to make my own: 

My own background was a happy accident!  I love to watercolor WITHIN the lines, but doing a random background like this makes me very nervous!  I started out by embossing the big fuzzy image from Touches of Texture twice in Versamark and clear embossing powder; I positioned it once on my Stamparatus, then turned my watercolor paper and stamped it again.  After heat-embossing the image, I just began filling in the area around it with various shades of green ink.  Imagine my surprise when it ended up looking like a big white hydrangea (at least that's what it looks like to me!)!!!  

I added some stamped leaves from Blooms and Wishes to continue to floral look, then diecut a bird  from a scrap of watercolor paper using the Birds and Blooms framelits. I watercolored it in some wren-ish colors and positioned him atop the edge of the blossom, and then added a sentiment from Sitting Here, stamped in Basic Black:

I didn't punch out the diecut areas of the bird, but left them intact by putting a little piece of tape on the back to hold the wing and the eye in place.  I mounted my watercolor piece on a card of Thick White Cardstock and I really love how it feels like a little piece of art!  

I hope you will play along with our sketch at As You See It this week!  Everyone really rocked the color challenge we had, so let's keep the mojo going!  You can check the samples from the DT here, and share yours with us as well!

So apparently this was the year for unusual egg dying! Not only did Cassidy tie-dye eggs, she painted some:

and she even dyed some with rice....the rice and the dye go into a baggie, then the egg gets shaken in the baggie, and the dye is transferred to the egg!

And big kid Wayne even got in on the action!

Enjoy your day and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Touches of Texture, Sitting Here, Blooms and Wishes
Card stock & Papers	Watercolor, Thick White
Ink	Garden Green, Tranquil Tide, Basic Black, Chocolate Chip, Crushed Curry, Versamark
Accessories
Tools	Heat Tool, White Embossing Powder, Big Shot, Birds and Blooms Framelits, Mini Dimensionals, Dimensionals

RRCB68 A Better Friend

Happy Monday, peeps!  Hope you had a wonderful weekend!  I haven't played with the Retro Rubber Challenge for a long time, and the inspiration photo was just too good to pass up!  

I wanted to make a card with only SU products, as well as incorporate the white, green and red shades, so I opted for a tiny little bit of Lemon Lime Twist, stamped with a grid pattern from Timeless Textures (2016) as my background; a Real Red Adirondack chair on a piece of white Wood Textures DSP, and a little bluebird from Sitting Here (2016) for a little interest.  The sentiment, stamped in Crumb Cake, is from Beautiful Bouquet.  I did add a little burlap ribbon for a bit of a country feel!  

I forgot to mention that this is a notecard-sized card!  And here's little closeup of my bluebird---stamped in Marina Mist and colored with a blender pen in Marina Mist and Calypso Coral inks:

And here are a few pictures of Longwood Gardens from my visit last week:

 

A beautiful day enjoying God's creation...with a little help from the Longwood gardeners!  Enjoy your day and be blessed!

Project Details—All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Specified
Stamps	Sitting Here, Beautiful Bouquet, Timeless Textures
Card stock & Papers	White Note Card, Lemon Lime Twist, Real Red, Wood Textures Stack DSP
Ink	Crumb Cake, Marina Mist, Calypso Coral, Lemon Lime Twist
Accessories	Burlap Ribbon (ret)
Tools	Big Shot, Seasonal Layers Thinlets, Blender Pen, Dimensionals

The Floating Cat for Fab Friday 113

So....did I get your attention with my catchy title?!  Sometimes my ideas work out, and sometime they don't!  I needed a sympathy card for a dear friend from church; he and his wife rescue cats and so I thought I would make a card for him using the stamp set Sitting Here, which I HAD to have and have rarely used!  I thought the Fab Friday sketch was nice:

 

I didn't really feel like coloring in the image, so I thought I'd do a monochromatic color scheme, using some Urban Underground DSP and Delightful Dijon and So Saffron inks:

I stamped the pillow on the same DSP, stamped the cat and colored it with a blender pen, then fussy-cut it out, and added some ribbon and cardstock banners as well as a little twine bow.  The issue came about when I adhered the cat with a dimensional:

I always use dimensionals to adhere things that I want to stand out...however, in this case, my cat now looks like it is floating above the bench cushion. Sigh....I left it there, although it makes me giggle a little.  Perhaps they won't notice the floating cat and will just enjoy the encouraging note I put inside!

A little photo, pre-demolition!  Her class was having a concert and she chose this dress to wear!

Enjoy your day--be blessed!  Be sure to come back tomorrow for a new Stamp Ink Paper challenge!

Project Details--All Products SU! Unless Otherwise Noted
Stamps	Sitting Here, Jar of Love
Card stock & Papers	Very Vanilla, So Saffron, Urban Underground DSP (ret)
Ink	So Saffron, Delightful Dijon
Accessories	So Saffron Chevron Ribbon (ret), Very Vanilla Thick Baker's Twine
Tools	Big Shot, Circles Framelits, Dimensionals, Blender Pen,

CTD393 and FMS237 Sitting Here

Happy Friday, everyone!  Ahhh...the weekend...another rain-soaked weekend....is upon us!  Blessedly, today is supposed to be sunny so I'll enjoy it while I can!  I had a chance to play with some new SU goodies yesterday!  I used the Freshly Made Sketches sketch and the colors from Color Throwdown for my card:

And here we go:

This new set is called Sitting Here and it has the sweetest images....I love this porch swing!  I was not sure if the top color of the palette was pale pink or tan, so I took artistic liberty and went with tan....Crumb Cake, in fact!  I stamped my images in Memento Black and colored them with an aquapainter and reinkers in shades of Crumb Cake, Melon Mambo, Strawberry Slush and Smoky Slate:

I added some Strawberry Slush twine and a Regal Rose scalloped border.  I also cut out the pillows and "puffed" one of them by contouring it with the end of a stylus from the back.  It gives it a cute little dimension in real life!  Finally, I stamped one of the sentiments from the set and added a Smoky Slate "hello" diecut from the Greetings thinlets.  Thanks for visiting today!

After a bath, Cassidy had her favorite lunch....croutons, tomatoes, salad and cheese with ranch dressing!  She was giggling because her crouton looked like a boot!!  She's got imagination!

Enjoy your day!