Sending Blessings

Happy Sunday, all!

Part 2 with the new Leaves All Around stencil and die set from the Greetery's 

newest release. This time with dimension, and the Jumbo moth.

I love the framing of any element, especially a sentiment. And this beautiful die

does it perfectly. I tried to mute my citrus colors, but it just wasn't happening.

 Kept going brighter and brighter, and then defined the leaves and blooms with pencil, 

for even more color.

I go where the card leads me. Sometimes, it's an idea that comes alive just as I planned.

Truly, most of the time it's an evolved effort!

Loving this release. It's brought such joy to a busy, stressed summer!

My moth used both wing dies, and like I said went from a pale guy to this 

bright showoff.

Hard to see, but the embossed copper sentiment is on a piece of vellum. Such a 

sweet script, rather animated like the fluttering moth!

I know of so many that could use a blessing right now. May have to do 

a few of these cards!

Enjoy your Sunday!

 

Birthday Butterfly

Good Saturday Morning! Have to say, we're having the strangest weather here in

my valley. Normally, end of July... hot, dry, and did I mention hot?

We're at the base of Yosemite, and the mountains are cloud covered, the air is

humid, and, still hot. We're also battling a fire in the Yosemite area. (Don't get me

started on poor government management).

Doing what makes me happy indoors, making cards.

When the Greetery has a release, I have no willpower. There I've said it.

This card is all newbies from their Sweet & Sunny collection. 

I've done several cards, and love every set! 

The butterfly, once cut, is stenciled, and I did it 4 times before I ended up with 

what I liked. The card grew around it. Not sure why I've been on a pink and blue

theme lately.

The Leaves All Around stencil is such a beautiful frame. Love how Betsy's sentiments

and butterfly fit perfectly within. I 'borrowed' Betsy's idea of adding Hollyhocks

to the leaf garland.

This card's going in the Birthday stash. I can't ever, ever, EVER have enough 

Birthday cards on hand!

Enjoy your weekend! Stay cool, and craft on!

Hollyhocks Birthday Card

 

I've been completely in love with the new Impressionism paintings, by artists

such as Erin Hanson, and even our own Dawn McVey. Capturing the bright 

colors and contemporary shapes was the goal with this card. Contrast and bright

happy movement. 

The Greetery's Hollyhocks die was cut and assembled using bright reds and pinks

and added to a bright blue background. Even The Greetery's birthday die emits a 

freeform feeling.

The new impressionist painters are fearless in their color combinations, often

using bright colors for ordinary objects.

I recently attended Beyond Van Gogh, and vowed to take up painting again. 

Have you seen it? 

Here's a sample of experiencing Van Gogh's art come to life!

Beyond Van Gogh is an experience, not just a gallery of paintings. The walls come alive

with movement, reflected on the floor. His brushstrokes are so emotional you almost

feel him attacking his canvas!

Our card making craft allows us to draw from all sorts of techniques and styles.

Hope you enjoyed my 'impression' of impressionism! 

Hollyhocks

 

The Greetery's Hollyhocks is the newest in the Botanicuts series, and it's won 

my heart. Dies for coloring, and assembling, this set is a stand out beauty.

Botanicuts: Hollyhocks is one of the feature flowers in the Sweet and Sunny collection.

If you follow The Greetery, Betsy has You Tube videos on coloring and assembling tips.

Beginning with a pale Seed Catalogue background,  The hollyhocks. were added, with a 

birthday greeting sentiment. (Let's Have a Word: Birthday die).

I love posing my finished hollyhocks with my Coleus, which has been so happy,

and blooming profusely.  

Next to Christmas cards, birthdays are the cards I do most. For no one in 

particular, this card joins the growing birthday stash.

Hope you enjoyed today's post. And hope you have a lovely weekend!

The Flower Challenge Reminder #70: CAS

 

Summer's in full swing in CA's Central Valley, hot and dry!

Keeping my precious flowers alive and blooming is always a task, 

and sometimes it works, sometimes, with temps at over 100 for weeks,

it's a loosing battle...

Fortunately, there's no shortage of colorful blooms in the craft room!

I'm bringing a reminder of our challenge at the Flower Challenge: CAS, 

Clean and Simple.

One central focus, with lots of white space. 

Pick a favorite flower and play along! 

The Greetery: 

Printshop Garden Goodness

Hello die

The Flower Challenge #70 Reminder

What's the Buzz?

 

All 'a-buzz' about the new honey jar from The Greetery... 

Hi there! I had several honey jars on my craft table, and decided to play with different

jar toppers. The honey jar can be left open or topped with a cloth like bonnet and string.

I went 'country' with this card and paired the honey jar with The Greetery's

Oopsie Daisy. 'Dipped' my honey stick with colored GA, (a technique I explain

in my previous post).

The honeycomb background corners are just the perfect accent for the jar.

Have a sweet weekend!

Sweet as Honey with the Greetery

 

FINALLY had a chance to play with the Greetery's newest release. It's been the

busiest summer, and there's no end in sight. Won't bore with all the details, but...

have to say, I relish any time I can enjoy in the craft cave!

Sweet and Sunny is a collection of summer's best, including a honey jar and stir

stick. We have had bee hives on the farm,  and they're a joy from start to finish.

Bees are essential for fruit trees, pollinating varieties for best harvest.

Have you ever eaten a honeycomb? We gather them up at the end of summer and

keep them throughout the year. 

My honey jar has a double cloth skirt, and the stir stick has a bit of pencil shading.

So much sweetness in this card, I decided to do a few more with different Buzz 

Worthy sentiments.

Kelly Lunceford added Nuvo drops to her stir stick, which I thought adorable.

No Nuvo drops in honey color, so I created my own, and I'll share it with you.

Recipe for dripping honey: Glossy Accents + Re-Inker

I used 1 drop Altenew's Butternut. Stir into a plastic throw away cup. 

I poured it onto the stir stick and moved the stick around for a minute until

the 'honey stayed where I wanted it. then, be sure to let it dry.

Have a great week!

The flower Challenge #70 CAS

 

Well hello! 

Did you see me on top of the moon? I'm there because I've been asked to join

a favorite challenge blog, The Flower Challenge!

It's a card challenge blog with the main star of the show being, flowers! 

If you happen to read my bio on the Flower Challenge Blog, you'll see

gardening is a passion with me. Which leads to the love of adding flowers to

my cards and projects, which of course leads to an extensive, ever growing

accumulation of stamps, dies, etc., that are flowers! Sound familiar?

The hardest choice here? What flower should I use for my debut? Altenew, of course!

My pick? Wallpaper Art, a favorite for coloring.

Don't tell my crafting sisters on the design team, but CAS is a hard one for me.

My instinct is to load up the layers and craft a card full of, well, full. 

Clean and Simple, lots of white space... mine is pale grey. Do you see a theme

with me? A rebel? Proudly, so! As CAS as it gets, hope my card brings all of you

inspiration to play along this month. Can't wait to see your lovelies!

Well, that's it, my friends.

Hello and Sending you all love and hugs.

If you have a minute, I'd love to hear what you think of my Clean and Simple card.

Have a great week!

The Flower Challenge #70 CAS

Anniversary Card

 

Hello, and so nice you dropped by...

Running low on much of my stash, and so happy to this sweet sentiment from the new

Greetery release, Grow Old with Me. It inspired the garden themed. card for an

anniversary couple.

Lots of stenciling and inking, along with a bit of copic coloring and white gel pen.

The star of the show: Those fabulous garden gloves! 

The Greetery

Garden Gear Gloves Stamps and Dies, Botanicuts Bluebells, and Lavender,

Seed Catalog Background Stamp, A Side of Greens Die.

The Card Concept: By the Sea

 

It's time for a new challenge at the Card Concept, and it's the last one through thee summer.

We take a break, before coming back in the fall. Our theme is, By The Sea.

Cool refreshing sea colors and the glass jar and shells inspired my Layered Theme card.

I loved a card by Kelly Lunceford, who designs for PapertreyInk. She was featuring

the Message In a Bottle set, and her card was wonderful! I used the colors on our 

photo, and added a bit of pink to the shells. 

I love the sentiment sticking out of the bottle!

The Shells and Palms are also from PTI, the sand swatch is an older set, not sure if it's

still available.

Hope you'll give By the Sea a try, and play along for our last (until fall) challenge. 

Have a great week!

The Card Concept #178 {By The Sea}

Bouquet of Love

 

Finally! It's been a busy month. 

I finally had some spare time to play with the new Greetery release, and

combined a few of the new goodies for this card.

I started with In Spades (the gardening tools, and decided on a darkish color. That meant

stamping the floral pattern again and again with white ink, before added colored ink.

Then I went over some of the petals with a white gel pen, and did some colored 

pencils as well. 

The handles are silver foil and Memory Box woodgrain. The Greetery's handle imprints

a spectacular woodgrain pattern, which I inked with Ranger's Oxide Walnut Stain.

The Background is the newest of the Greetery's Rubber Cling, Seed Catalog 

Background Stampwhich covers the whole A2 sized card. 

I just could'n't bring myself to die cut this beautiful stamp! Left it whole

and inked the corners.

The new Botanicuts flowers were all added, and I added some roses too. 

It's A Wrap is cut from vellum, and I added a sweet little tag from

Hug In a Mug.

Just heard there's a new Greetery release coming out at the end of this month.

It's for sure these newbies won't be put away before the new sets are on my 

worktable!