Splashes of Watercolor

I’m just going to do some name (and photo) dropping now-

with Heidi Blankenship (what a doll!)

with Candy Williams and Kazan Clark (of 2 Sketches For You) - one of mine and Candy’s biggest idols

Kittie and Sherry doing the 7 Gypsies make & take.

with that gorgeous Jenn Balcer!

Some of my favorite people in the whole world-  Bev, Kittie, Joy, Sherry and Cami.   We had so much fun hanging out with Joy & Cami. We did the make & take at the Advantus booth and Cami and I exchanged ours, so now I have a piece of Cami art that I can treasure forever!  Love ya, babe!!!

Adorable Kimberly Crawford.  We had to drag her away from her demonstration at Spellbinders.  Thanks, Kim!

Mish & Cami - had enough name dropping yet?

Maren & I worked together on the Jacksonbelle Embellishments design team and now she’s a Paper Crafts Go-To Gal!!  Woo hoo, Maren!  I’m so proud and happy for you!

The adorable Unity team!  We had a great time hanging and chatting with them!

I think I’ll stop for now.  There are a lot more photos but I’ll upload them tomorrow.  This old lady needs a rest after all the excitement of meeting so many wonderful people so far this week!

Thank you so much for stopping by!  Don’t forget to check in again later!

Hi all!  It’s time for another Color Throwdown and this week LeAnne presented a REAL challenge.  At least for me.

I had a hard time with these colors.  But, you know, I think it’s because my entire house was once decorated in these colors when I was going through a country phase, and now I try to stay as far away from this particular color combination as possible!   Don’t get me wrong, it’s a beautiful combination.  Just not for me!  LOL!

I used Natasha’s FTL52 sketch for this card.  And I used all Stampin’ Up! stamps and mostly all SU papers and inks.  The image was first stamped in mellow moss.  Can’t remember the last time I used that color!  The flowers and bird were stamped again separately in their respective colors, cut out and popped up on dimensionals.  The bird’s eye, the flower center and the sentiment are each embellished with a Swarovski crystal.

Please visit the Color Throwdown blog for details on the challenge and check out the wonderful creations of the design team here:

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Barbara * Cathy * Danielle * LeAnne * Tammy * Juliana (Guest Designer/July)

Thanks for visiting today!  I won’t be participating in the Rubbernecker Wacky Wednesday challenge this week…I’m in Orlando for CHA!  And yes, I’m a CHA virgin, so you can just imagine how excited I am!!

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• Stamps: Wings of Friendship, Friendly Words jumbo wheel
  
• Paper: Prism - simply smooth white, SU pink pirouette, rose red, bordering blue
• Ink: Versafine onyx black, SU rose red, bordering blue, mellow moss, versamark, rose red marker
  
• Other: SU scallop punch, ribbon, Spellbinders ribbon tags trio, dimensionals, Swarovski crystals
  

Kittie and I were in Tim’s 8:00 a.m. class this morning!  Ugh, we really had to get up early, but it was SO WORTH it!!!!

More later!

to CHA!!  Yes, I’m a CHA virgin and in a couple of hours I’ll be on a flight to Orlando.

I’ll be staying with Kittie, and so will Bev and Sherry!  Candy lives just a few minutes away, so I’ll get to spend a lot of time with her too!  YAY!

Tomorrow, I have a Tim Holtz class and a Claudine Hellmuth class as well.  I’m SO darned excited!

But what I’m most excited about is meeting all the people that I now only know online.  What fun!  I know I’ll get to meet Barbara face-to-face on Friday!  Yippee!!

I’ll try to post photos during the week.  If I don’t get to it, be sure to check with Kittie or Sherry.  They’re always right on top of things!!

Thanks for visiting today!  Talk at you soon!

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I was honored that Sharon asked me to make a sample for her Dare to Get Dirty challenge today.  Of course I said yes right away!  It’s a color challenge: use black and white and just a touch of red.

I had no idea where this card was going to end up when I started, but I did know I wanted to start with the white background and the Wildflower background stamped in black.  I also wanted a lot of it to show, so I decided just to go with that and an embellishment that would pop!  I’m happy with how it turned out!

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Go check out all the challenges  HERE and play along with us.  So much fun!!  You are a Fan Club member, right?  It is SO worth it to join in on all the fun!  C’mon!!  This is your chance to be a “dirty girl”!!!

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• Stamps: Wildflower background (447) - Rubbernecker Stamps
  
• Paper: Prism Simply Smooth white & classic red, black
• Ink: Versafine onyx black
  
• Other: clear EP, Labels One & Labels Four Nestabilities, ribbon, Heidi Swapp flowers, glittery button, DMC floss, foam tape, wonder tape
  

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Strong coffee!  I can always use some of that!

Today is Wacky Wednesday!!  Yay!  The famous and famously talented Kittie is our hostess this week and her challenge is for us to use CIRCLES on our cards.  I’ve used several on my card below, starting with the Basic Grey Porcelain paper.

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The yummy latte (or coffee with Baileys!) was stamped in Ranger Clear Resist ink on watercolor paper and painted using Tombow markers and a water brush.  Then I cut it out and mounted it on 3 layers of circles cut with my circle Nestabilities.

The stitching was done by piercing first with my piercing tool/mat/template, then sewing with a needle and 2 strands of DMC floss #3862 (which is an incredibly close match to the new Soft Suede from SU).  I fell in love with how the hand stitching looks when I first discovered Peet Roeven’s blog - Peet’s Scrapalbum.  She’s has such amazing style and hand stitches on almost every one of her cards!  Here’s a link to her tutorial: Hand Stitching

You have to play along with us!  Come on!  Everyone can do circles!!  Check out the details of the challenge here: Rubbernecker Stamps blog.  And here’s some more inspiration for you:

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Bev * Candy * Joan * Juliana

Kittie * Linda * Shelly * Sherry

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Thanks for visiting today!  And I’d like to issue a little reminder that the 2009 edition of Dare to Get Dirty begins at Splitcoaststampers tomorrow (Thursday).  There’ll be challenges all day long for 3 days straight, so make sure you have lots of caffeine and adhesive, and join us there!

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• Stamps: Coffee Time Set (458), Grid background (451)
  
• Paper: watercolor paper, soft suede, dusty durango, Basic Grey - Porcelain 6×6 pad
  
• Ink: Ranger Clear Resist, Adirondack Espresso, Tombow markers
• Other: water brush, clear embossing powder, corner rounder punch, Martha Stewart arch lattice border punch, circle Nestabilities, piercer & mat & template, needle & DMC floss #3862, foam tape

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Woo hoo!  It’s time for the 52nd edition of the Color Throwdown challenge!  I can’t believe we’ve been doing this for a year already!  Fun, fun, fun!

Here are this week’s colors as chosen by the fabulously talented Ms. Barbara:

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This week our sponsor is Clear & Simple Stamps!  Talk about some cute stamps!  I really love that there are several sentiments and accessories with each stamp set.  The set I’m using today is BBQ Darling.   Absolutely perfect for a fun summer card!  Come to think of it….it’s not just for summer!  I have quite a few friends who grill out and make huge productions of it before each Carolina Panthers football game.  They’re tailgating maniacs!  This would work perfectly for them as well!

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You may not believe this, but I had NO patterned paper with this week’s colors in it.  Gasp!  I know!!  So I ended up making my own using my Copic markers and a straight edge ruler.  And I actually had fun doing it!  I used the chisel edge end of the marker - the broad side for the lavender lines and the narrow tip for the green and brown lines.

Now, we’d love for you to play along with us!  There are prizes involved!!  Check out all the details at the Color Throwdown blog.  And for more inspiration, visit the design team’s blogs:

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Barbara * Cathy * Danielle * LeAnne * Tammy * Juliana (Guest Designer/July)

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Thanks for stopping by!

• Stamps: BBQ Darling - Clear & Simple Stamps
  
• Paper: Prism Simply Smooth white, perfect plum, chocolate chip, certainly celery
• Ink: tuxedo black - Memento, onyx black - Versafine, cloudy blue - Adirondack, certainly celery
  
• Other: ink blending tool, straight edge ruler, circle & petite oval Nestabilities, Martha Stewart arch lattice border punch, cloud template, Pigma Micron pen, foam tape, Copic markers

It’s time for another Wacky Wednesday challenge!  Juliana is our incredibly talented hostess this week and we have an inspiration challenge.  We were to choose an item from an Etsy website with all kinds of super cool bags and totes.  Check the Rubbernecker blog  for the link and all the details.  This is the bag I chose to use as my inspiration:

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And here is my card:

So what do you think?

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I used one of my most favorite Rubbernecker Stamps images Chrysanthemum (340-10), and embossed it using Ranger Clear Resist ink and vanilla EP.  There are 3 layers to it, each popped up with foam tape.

We hope you’ll be able to join us this week for the challenge.  Please visit the Rubbernecker Blog, choose an inspiration piece, and start creating!  Here are links to the design team blogs, for even more inspiration:

Bev * Candy * Joan * Juliana

Kittie * Linda * Shelly * Sherry

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Thanks for visiting with me today!  Come back anytime (preferably often)!!

Hi everyone!  We’ve started something new at the Color Throwdown blog – a sponsor program.  This week our sponsor is DRS Designs.  Please check out today’s Color Throwdown post and learn a little about this great company!  You have a chance to win a prize from our sponsor by linking your creation using our colors to today’s CTD post.  But there are a few rules to follow, so be sure to read all the instructions !  We’ll randomly choose a winner from all the submissions!

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Here are this week’s colors:

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I couldn’t wait to use this adorable Ladybug Flower (G953) for my card today and I complemented it with the Sending You a Smile (D289) sentiment.  I had a lot of fun coloring and piecing this image!

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Please play along in the Color Throwdown with us!  We enjoy seeing your creations so much!

The design team has put together some awesome samples using DRS Designs stamps.  You can check them out here:

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Barbara * Cathy * Danielle * LeAnne * Tammy * Juliana (Guest Designer/July)

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Thanks for stopping by today.  I hope you’ll stop back by for the Wacky Wednesday post in just a little bit.

I just love the color combination of this Stampin’ Up! Urban Oasis designer paper, so I chose to play off of that for an anniversary card for my DD and her husband.

I also decided to try the ribbon rose that I had seen and was totally wowed by on Christine’s blog.  She has a great tutorial HERE.

The paper rose is done in 3 layers (of course!), and shaded a little with a Copic marker.  I also thought there should be 3 ribbon roses as well.

A simple card really, but I just love the visual impact of the kiwi on the basic gray!

Hey!  I just realized this is an SU only card!  I don’t know when the last time I did that was!  So simple and coordinated!

Thanks for another visit!  I really appreciate your visits and comments, and I sure hope you’ll keep coming back!

• Stamps: Fifth Avenue Floral, Congrats - Stampin’ Up!
• Paper: kiwi kiss, Urban Oasis DSP
  
• Ink: Versafine - onyx black
  
• Other: ribbon, N1 Copic marker, corner rounder, wonder tape, foam tape