Celebrate!

Hello!

Surprise! Two days in a row? How can that be?

Today is Jessica's birthday! 

She is 17.

Gulp

While checking out some You Tube videos I saw this lovely card being created and I thought it was beautiful and elegant and a bit more grown up. Kind of like my Jessica. :)

The stamp is from Concord and 9th and celebrate is a die from My Favorite Things.

She had a full day of school, came home for a bit to do some homework and then headed back to school to participate in the first Battle of the Books for this school year.

And, for the first time since she joined, her school came in first!

How's that for a wonderful birthday surprise. 

If you know Jessica, you know reading is one of her very favorite things to do. 

*Ü*

Birthday Girl

with Amy at Red Robin, Jessica's choice for her birthday dinner.

Thanks for stopping by!

Hope your week is off to a great start!

Happy New Year! I've Got Projects to Share...

Hello!!

Happy New Year! 

I hope 2019 will be filled with lots of crafty things for you. 

I also hope I am able to finagle a way to create and share more this year. 

I'm going to start out with a bang, I think.

I've got a few things to show you. 

I was talking with a friend yesterday about knitting and crafts. I realized I go through phases in my crafty life. There are years when I crochet a lot, or knit a lot. Lately, I've been doing lots of counted cross stitch. I learned how to do it with my mom when we were on vacation at friend's house here in Colorado back in the late 80s? I don't quite remember.  I've enjoyed it ever since, though. :)

I have a friend who loves foxes and I found a really unique fox pattern that I stitched as a gift for her. 

I found the pattern on Etsy. It was fun to stitch. 

My friend's daughter is a huge fan of wolves. I've looked for years for a good wolf project to make for her. Finally, I found one that I thought she would like. 

My friend and her daughter seemed to be very happy with their gifts. 

I know I really enjoyed creating them. 

I do handwork in the evenings when it is too dark to make cards. 

Unfortunately, I had need of a sympathy card this past week. 

I had a sketch setting out and I used it along with paper from an older DCWV paper pad called Linen Closet. Remember when those were available at Joann's? Love this paper. Thought it was pretty for this card and I do hope it offers some comfort. 

And to end on a bit more of happy note, here's a card I created recently using MFT's Cool Christmas stamp set. Oh gosh, I bought so many stamp sets for Christmas cards this year and I didn't get to use them! But I used this one for a non Christmas card. 

I had fun coloring it with Copic markers and sort of futzing with the design. My friend Kay makes really fun scene cards in this vein and that's what inspired me. I used MFT's Petite Plaid pattern paper for the background. I also used Lawn Fawn's Mountain borders for the mountains. Those snowmen just make me smile. 

Here's a bit of a close up.

 These pictures were taken with my phone, so if they are slightly blurry, that is why. 

Thank you so much for stopping by. 

I appreciate the visit. 

Hope you have an awesome start to your new year. 

Crafty hugs,

Penguin in a Floatie

 Hello!

Before we left for vacation, I had been working on a case of a Kay Miller card using some images gifted to me from a new Instagram friend(Thanks so much, Esther, if you ever read my blog). I had most of it ready to go. Yesterday I finished it.  For my background I used a alcohol inked background that I had created a few months ago. I love how it looks like water. I colored my images using Copic markers and added some Spectrum Noir sparkle. Unfortunately, the camera didn't capture that. I had fun creating this one.

I recently got a new light box in the hopes I can get some better pictures of my cards. I liked this style, which was recommended by a blogger, Debbie Olson, because of the LED light strips which help to brighten the box. I'm still learning with how best to take pictures using it. Haven't had much time to do much since I received it.

One of the highlights when we go to Sioux Falls is taking the Sculpture Walk in the downtown area. I love the small town feel of the walk and how pretty the main street is. They change the sculptures each year. This one is my favorite from this year. I adore Laura Ingalls Wilder and really enjoyed this one of her and Jack.

This Sea Horse was pretty cool, too. 

Another look at my card. 

Thanks so much for stopping by! 

Hope you have a terrific day.

Hugs!

Coloring Gnomes for Coloring Challenge

Hello there!

It is with huge thanks to Darnell and her Mister that I am posting today. I expressed to her that I haven't been posting much on my blog recently because it's become very inconvenient and time consuming for me to do so with the purchase of a new camera several months ago and the fact that my phone only uploads a single picture at a time to my Photoshop Elements program. First world problems to be sure, but annoying and made me avoid uploading and editing photos for the blog. She responded with questions about why I didn't upload to the cloud. Um...because I never thought about it and more importantly didn't really understand how to do it. I knew vaguely that Google has a drive and photos and all that, but this old gal never really paid attention. My interest piqued, I started looking into it. So I'm trying upload pictures to Drive and Photos and I get a new email from Darnell and her hubby about being able to upload pictures  to my camera's cloud. So, now I'm looking into that as well. I think I'm going to have pictures in several clouds at this rate. I don't care as long as they are safe and secure and EASY for me to access for editing and posting to my blog. As I tell most people, I only know enough about technology to be dangerous. :)

All that to say...here's my first attempt at uploading from one of the clouds this morning. I was able to get it to my editing program and then uploaded to Blogger. Yay, me!

This stamp set is from My Favorite Things and is called You Gnome Me. I had been on the fence about getting this set for some time, but after seeing this pop up card from Rachel at The Unpampered Stamper that I jumped off the fence into ownership. Rachel was kind enough to share with me the Copics she used to color her gnomes so vibrantly. I copied as closely as I could and took a liberty or two to make it my own. I didn't buy the dies, so I will have to fussy cut the images here pretty soon so I can make something with them. 

This is one of my shares for The Daily Marker's 30 Day Coloring Challenge. Speaking of which, I haven't colored yet today. I've been a little preoccupied with my head in the clouds. 

Oh and I  have Darnell to thank again because she shared something about comments coming to our inboxes again without having to leave ourselves one first. Go here to read what she found out.  Let's hope it works with any comments left on this post. 

You may be seeing posts from me more consistently!

Thanks so much for stopping by! 

I hope you have an amazing day.

Alcohol Inks and Mandalas

I wanted to pop in today to share a few cards I created recently. I am sincerely trying to post more frequently despite the fact that I am having supreme difficulty getting decent photos of my projects.

I've been trying different things for picture taking. Trying my phone, which ends up slightly blurry. Trying my camera, which ends up blurry or dark or in some other way unappealing. Trying in my living room by the big picture window, which ends up with a blue cast. On my dining room table, which ends up blurry and a bit dark. I even tried my bright bedroom as seen in the first photo here and that looks odd to me. I've tried editing these and this is as good as I can get it. I really think my camera is too old, but I haven't pulled the trigger to buy a new one. I have to do something though, because it's getting pretty frustrating. So, feel free to enlarge if you like, but no promises on how decent it looks. Eventually I'll get it worked out.

Enough of that vent, here's what I've been working on.

The first card I am sharing is to give you an idea of what I used for the second card. I used alcohol inks on Yupo paper to get the look you see in this heart. I also added some gold mixative. I tried to capture how pretty and intense the color is.

The Lawn Fawn hugs sentiment is cut from some gold cardstock I bought at Hobby Lobby over the holidays. It's got some dimension from a couple of cuts from black cardstock and layered. 

I had some of the alcohol inked paper left over and recently received the My Favorite Things new Magical Mandala die which I thought would look neat die cut from the alcohol inked background. I tried it on a background I didn't like as much and it failed to cut cleanly despite running the die through a couple of times. I thought the Yupo paper couldn't be cut cleanly until I saw a blogger who shared a card with this same die cut from Yupo paper. I asked her if she did anything special. Nope, just ran it through a few times. So I tried again, this time running it through like 5-6 times. It cut better, but I still struggled to get some of the pieces out.  (My Cuttlebug is the original one from like 2005 or so, it probably is showing its age, too). 

Here's what I came up with. 

 Despite all the struggles getting a clean cut, I am thrilled with the end result!

The happy birthday is heat embossed in gold using the sentiment from Paper Smooches recently released In Stitches stamp set. The rounded corner stitched mat is from MFT Blueprints 31.

This final card is not alcohol inked at all. I just thought I'd share it because I was using the Magical Mandala die. It cut regular cardstock beautifully. I cased a card made by Torico  as shown in this blog post . She colored vellum with Copic markers to get the stained glass effect. I remember learning that technique way back in my early years of paper crafting. I love how these techniques come around again and are so fresh and fun. 

I didn't have a frame for the stained glass window effect that Torico used, so I adhered the vellum to the cardstock mandala using Stick It. I then fussy cut around the edge  of the mandala to cut away the excess vellum. I colored the back side of the vellum using Copic markers.  I used what turned out to be the last of the adhesive in my Xyron 5 inch machine to cover the back of the vellum so I could attach it to the mat. I heat embossed the sentiment in silver. I added the white dots with my white Uniball gel. pen. I'm so happy with the final result. 

Thanks so much for stopping by. 

I hope you have a happy day!

Hugs,

You Are a Blessing...

Happy New Year! I haven't posted in forever because my regular camera isn't working right. It keeps shutting off, even if it has fresh batteries. I got it Christmas 2005, so it's had a long life. It's a Kodak Z740, which is no longer made. I don't know what camera to get to replace it. I take pictures with my phone, but getting them off the phone to edit is not as easy as one would hope. The numbering system is really convoluted (in my humble opinion) and I can only upload one at a time to my editing program. Because it's not very convenient to get them off the phone to edit them, I simply haven't done it.

Today, I thought I'd try my camera again to see if it was working better after a long rest. I managed to snap one photo before it shut off. One is better than none, right?! Btw, I mention my issue to my husband and he thinks the batteries are the issue. We use rechargables and they are most likely getting old. We'll try buying some new ones and see it that helps. (fingers crossed)

I didn't have to go to work yesterday and had high hopes that I could get a few cards made while it was quiet in the house. I sincerely tried, but I think I'm pretty rusty at cardmaking now. I attempted one card 4 different times and each one ended up in the trash. I smudged the stamping each time. Don't ask me how. It was a simple card idea, I promise, but it just wasn't working out for me. Jennifer McGuire makes it look SO easy! :) So, I scrapped that card idea and tried a different one.

Success!

I used some NBUS from My Favorite Things. Geometric Greenery, Geometric Grid background stamp and a stitched rectangle die. Here's how it turned out.

After the frustration with the first four attempts, I'm very happy with the end result of this one! I colored in the leaf with some Johanna Basford alchol markers I bought at Michaels a few months ago. I went over it with my Spectrum Noir Clear Sparkle marker. It's fussy cut out. 

Really simple, which is fine by me. My first card of 2017! Yay! Hopefully more to follow in the not too distant future. :)

Thanks so much for stopping by...if you are still meandering this way, that is.

Hugs,

Jeanne

Hello~Watercolor

Hi There!

Yesterday I started a case of a card by Suzy Plantamura as seen in this blog post. I was feeling brave enough to watercolor, actually. I painted the background panel and dried it with my heat gun. Then I added some more color and dried it. Then I set it aside. I stamped and watercolored the images. I used the Artist Loft watercolors from Michaels. I really like the blues and greens in that set. Hey, you can't be $4.99, either!

I'm making an effort to tweak my cases a bit more. Here you can see I added the journaling panel (from Lawn Fawn). I did die cut these images, but had stamped first and then die cut. Um, it's hard to line them up as the dies are solid and I can't quite tell where I should tape them. As it was, each cut was offset, meaning I ended fussy cutting to get the images to look good. Guess with these dies, you do the die cutting first and line up the stamps, huh? Now I know. 

Here's a close up. You can see I also watercolored the journaling card. All of the images are adhered flat with no pop dots this time. Being the messy watercolor-er that I am, I went over the images with a Micron pen, too, so you can see the eyes and the wings. :)

I'm also making more of an effort to decorate the inside of the card, too. I had a piece of leftover watercolor background that I die cut and added the images with SSS Fog ink. 

I so wanted to add some sparkle, but figured with it being a watercolored piece, I'd just mess it up. Sequins didn't look right, either. Ah well. Some white dots are all the embellishments this card got. 

That's it from me today.

Thanks so much for stopping by. 

I hope you have a great start to your week!

Hugs,

Jeanne

Make a Wish and a Squirrel!

Hello again!

Wow, I'm posting two days in a row. Go me! :) A card and another coloring page to share. 

First up, the card. I was inspired by this one made by Yuunson Hur. I really liked the rainbow ink blending and how the heat embossed candles stood out. And I braved flicking a little Martha Stewart pearl paint onto the card. I'm so nervous to do that for fear I will mess the card up. I really like the font in the word Wish. The stamp and wonky stitched die are from My Favorite Things. 

I realized after I posted yesterday, I've shown current pictures of Jessica, but not of Amy. Here she is doing 'the whip' after blowing out the candles on her cupcakes. Silly girl, but she has a bright smile on her face and I'll take that any day. 

I finished another coloring page from The Enchanted Forest! The image isn't quite as detailed as the other ones I've colored, so I was able to get it mostly done yesterday.  Maggie's Colours posted a how to video on how she colored the squirrel and I was really impressed with the soft colors and her blending skills. Even as a how to, her video goes quickly and I stopped it often. She used a different brand of pencils than I have, and they may have had a different type of lead. My blending isn't as soft as hers, but I really liked some of the color combinations. The leaves right under his cheek with the yellow, greenish color and blue really made me smile. 

Again, some of these color combinations I never would have thought of to try, so I am grateful for these videos to help me get out of my color choice box. :)

That's it from me today. I hope you have a great start to your weekend and a Happy 4th to all my American friends. :) Be safe. 

Hugs,

Jeanne

A Couple of Cards to Celebrate and a New Colored Page to Share

How is it the end of June already? Yikes! Before I know it, it'll be back to school time and my days of relaxing will be gone! I'm relaxing so well, I've barely made any cards! Ruh-roh. I've got a few things to share today though. :)

First up is a card I made after being inspired by this one by Nichol Spohr Magouirk. I thought it was adorable. I don't own any of those fancy schmancy watercolor pens, but I do own some watercolor pencils and that is what I used on this card. I also just used Lawn Fawn's Here's the Scoop set. I don't own the other one she used. Can you see the sparkle on the thanks? I added the new Spectrum Noir sparkle pens to my stash and am really impressed with how shimmery it looks.

Next up is a card that my daughter Jessica made for her sister, Amy, who just turned...gulp, 15 last weekend. Oh my word, now we have to think about all new kinds of milestones...like driving. Nope, not gonna do that just yet. I'm not ready. Even if she's chomping at the bit. LOL

Anyway, not that I am biased or anything, but I think Jessica did a fabulous job on the card. I showed her this one made by the fabulous Kay Miller and she was eager to get started. She modified it to have purple stripes as purple is Amy's favorite color. :)

Awww...sisterly love. 

I have been struggling to sit down in my crafty corner to work on cards because I've totally been bitten by the coloring bug. Thanks, in large part, to You Tube. I am awed by the coloring talent that is out there. I am also so thankful that they film and share how they are coloring the pages for all of us newbies to watch and learn. 

I want to thank you so much for the very kind and encouraging comments that you've left for me in regards to my coloring. They mean a lot to me and I am truly touched that you like what I color. I am not trained in art in any way. I struggle mightily to come up with ideas on my own. Give me a blank page, or an uncolored image, and I really don't know what to do. I have spent lots of time trying to come up with something appealing on my own from scratch and it is extremely frustrating for me. I just cannot do it. So, I copy. I see something I like and I try to recreate it and put my own spin on a part of it. It may not be a huge change, but I will do something a bit different that makes it more my own. But the inspiration is always from a source that is not me. That's why I never call myself an artist. I don't feel like I am one. I'm a copier for sure. And I always credit the project that inspired me. 

That being said, I saw this video on You Tube and fell in love with the colors. And I had to color the page using those same colors. You saw one of the combos on my bee page.

Aren't the colors so pretty? This dragonfly is in The Enchanted Forest by Johanna Basford. 

The video is in three parts and I have to admit, the quality of the video isn't that great. She said in the comments that this was the only video that she has made that was of the poor quality. But I didn't really care. I set up my tablet at my table and colored along with her, stopping when needed. There is a third video on how she did the background and I didn't really like how it looked, so I opted not to add color to the background. I am very happy with how this turned out. 

I've already started another page. 

Hooked, I tell you. I am hooked!

Thanks so much for stopping by. 

I hope you have a happy day!

Hugs,

Jeanne