Holly Jolly Unicorn Tag

This year, I’m participating in Ellen Hutson’s 12 Tags of Christmas 2019 Challenge for the first time. I’ve got a couple of other tag designs roughly sketched out, but this month has been so crazy that I haven’t yet had the time to sit down and make them. The design for this tag, however, leapt into being pretty easily — it was inspired by Carly’s tag for Day 10. I liked her circular base, the candy-like colors she chose, and her use of holly.

For my tag, I went for a pepperminty color scheme with cool, minty greens, a pink-toned red, and lots of white. Arranging the sentiment took way longer than I’d like to admit, but I’m satisfied with how it turned out — definitely worth all those scraps of paper I consumed while testing iterations.

I originally intended to make a pile of presents for the unicorn to be standing among, but that didn’t work with the circular card, so I ended up going with a wreath of presents and holly in a scaled-down echo of Carly’s. Rather than stamping the unicorn and presents in black ink, which would have been very stark against the white areas, I used a dark purple, which adds to the cool tones present in the rest of the design. Adding dimension to the white body with a purple marker, instead of just grey, further boosted the candy-like wintry feel. I covered all the white surfaces of the unicorn with a shimmer pen, and for once I think my camera managed to capture it decently.

The pearly shimmer pigment ink I used to stamp the sparkles and snowflakes is somewhat opaque, but it has almost no color to it, which makes it impossible to see on white paper unless the light hits it just right. I wanted the sparkles and snowflakes to fill in the space, not just hint at glimmer, so I first stamped Fairy Dust ink three times to get a light cool grey, then layered Platinum Planet on top of it, muting the grey color and leaving the shapes pale but clearly defined. Although the sparkles and snowflakes don’t show up well in the photos, they’re perfectly visible in person.

I almost forgot to stamp the back of the tag, and then I had to scramble to see if I even had any “to/from” stamps to stamp it with! Somehow, I only have these two, so they’ll be getting a workout if I can make the time to create more tags. Do you have any good “to/from” stamp sets to recommend?


Supplies
Stamps:  Lawn Fawn “A Little Sparkle” (unicorn, sparkles), “Winter Alpaca” (snowflakes), “Year Five” (present);  Hero Arts “Build a Wreath by Lia” (holly);  Papertrey Ink “City Scene Christmas Sentiments” (“merry & bright”);   Clearly Besotted Simple Silhouettes (“to,” “from”)
Dies:  Hero Arts “Nesting Circle Dies” (3 ¼”);   Lawn Fawn “A Little Sparkle”
Ink:  Memento Elderberry, Brilliance Platinum Planet;  The Ton Caribbean Turquoise;  Hero Arts Pale Tomato;  WPlus9 Fairy Dust
Copics:  R27+R22 (cheek, rear present), V20+C00 (body shadows), BG32 (hooves and ear);  Sharpie Mint (mane, tale, presents), Turquoise (mane and tail);  Stampin’ Up Blendabilities Costal Cabana medium (mane and tail)
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Stamper’s Select White
Miscellanea:  Zig Two-Way Glue Pen, Spectrum Noir Clear Sparkle pen, hole punch

MFT Color Challenge #101

The palette of MFT’s color challenge this week seemed very wintry to me, so I broke out my new “Winter Hills” set, which I had been itching to use ever since I got it for my birthday. I stamped the image in teal ink rather than black to give a frostier feel to the trees and the snow-covered hills, and I used coral shades for the sky to evoke a December sunset. My lighter teal color veered away from the saturation of Summer Splash since I needed something very pale for the shadows giving dimension to the snow, but Copic BG000 fits the category of light aqua. The teal of the roofs is more green than the ink of the outlines, but since the palette is so narrow, the colors harmonize rather than competing—I hope! The red house and barn round out the tetrad, but it’ll be fun to try a less conventional color for them next time.

I applied clear shimmer to all the white spaces within the frame—glimmering snow was just the little something to take the super-simple card up a notch. The shimmer is arresting in person, but no matter how I tried, I couldn’t get the photos to represent it well in its entirety. Whenever the camera did succeed in capturing glitter, it would only catch one area rather than every snowbank. One day, I will manage to photograph glitter properly, but it is not this day.

Supplies
Stamps:  Papertrey Ink “Winter Hills”, “Vintage Picnic Sentiments”
Ink:  Memento Teal Zeal, Love Letter
Copics:  R27, BG000, 0;  Blendabilities Costal Cabana dark, Calypso Coral light, medium, and dark
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Stamper’s Select White
Miscellanea:  Scotch Permanent Double-Sided Tape, Spectrum Noir clear shimmer pen

Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”

PTI’s “Create Along With Us” Challenge, September 2018, & MFT Sketch Challenge #402

This month’s Papertrey Ink release was heavily Christmas-themed, but since I’m not yet in the mode of making Christmas cards, I looked for inspiration that I could use for a more generally autumn- or winter-themed card for the Create Along With Us challenge.

What first drew me to Michelle’s card was the color scheme, but the reason I ended up choosing it as my inspiration piece was the background, since I could emulate that with the large pine branch stamp from PTI’s “Winter Woods” set. I love the Ocean Tides ink color, but I haven’t anything like it (I’m going to have to get the cube during PTI’s anniversary sale next spring). The closest I could come to the color was Hero Arts Forever Green, and that’s definitely green, not greyish blue-green. Still, it works well for pine needles. In hindsight, I think perhaps the card would have been more cohesive if I had stamped the wood of the branches in grey rather than brown and if I had chosen lighter colors for the background, but at least the color of the branches is realistic.

Although I have a fox stamp from a Stampin’ Up set, it’s horizontal, so I chose the chickadee from “Winter Woods” since it fit the vertical layout I was following from both Michelle’s card and this week’s MFT sketch challenge. Since the chickadee faces right, I flipped the sketch to accommodate it. The solid pine trees behind the chickadee are from the aforementioned SU set; I fussy-cut them and colored them with an alcohol marker to make the focal point bolder than the background.

For the banner, I smooshed a strip of cardstock against the Field Greens ink pad and let it dry overnight. It was still a bit splotchy when I went to stamp the sentiment, but at least it coordinates! The finished card is busier than I prefer; if I ever have time in the future, I’d like to tackle the design again with much lighter ink in the background. It might be fun to use the other birds from the same set—perhaps softer green pine branches for a background for the cardinal or pale grey snowflakes behind the bluejay.

Supplies
Stamps:  Papertrey Ink “Winter Woods”, “Vintage Picnic Sentiments”;  Stampin’ Up “Life in the Forest”
Dies:  Papertrey Ink “Winter Woods”;  My Favorite Things “A2 Stitched Rectangle STAX Set 2” (3 9/16” x 4 13/16”; 1 7/8” x 3 1/8”)
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Grey Flannel, Toffee Crunch, Northern Pine;  Hero Arts Field Greens;  Simon Says Stamp Fog
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Stamper’s Select White, cheap lightweight grey cardstock from my stash
Miscellanea:  Scotch Permanent Double-Sided Tape, Bic Marking Forever Green

Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”

MFT Sketch Challenge #401

A couple of weeks ago, I spotted this card by Larissa Heskett and fell in love with the color scheme. My sister’s birthday is approaching, and she loves pandas, so making her a card provided the perfect excuse for CASEing Larissa’s. This week’s sketch challenge from My Favorite Things suited the layout I had in mind, and I’m also submitting the card to MFT’s Birthday Project.

I stamped the flowers multiple times, two layers for the orange, three or four for the yellow, because I wanted deep colors as well as a solid impression to capture the details of the flowers. I drew in the stems and am not happy with them—it’ll be a while before I can freehand anything satisfactorily. Whatever I draw never quite conforms to the law of gravity, and the lack of realism bugs me, but the only way to improve is to practice, so I’m continuing my attempts and trying to convince myself that the wonky results are just going to look whimsical to anyone else.

I edged the matte in the same orange ink, just smooshing the cube onto the paper. The cheaper cardstock rippled a little as it dried, but my dictionary helped mitigate that somewhat, and the focal panel disguises the remaining undulations.

Supplies
Stamps:  Mama Elephant “Incoming Mail” (panda);  WPlus9 “Fresh Cut Florals”;  Papertrey Ink “Keep It Simple Birthday III” (sentiment)
Dies:  My Favorite Things “A2 Stitched Rectangle STAX Set 1”
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black;  My Favorite Things Dye Persimmon;  Hero Arts Butter Bar
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Stamper’s Select White, cheap lightweight white cardstock from my stash
Miscellanea:  Scotch Permanent Double-Sided Tape, Sakura Pigma Micron 01 (0.25 mm)

Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”

MFT Sketch Challenge #399 & Color Challenge #100

I particularly like this fortnight’s color challenge—it’s a splendid palette for the one-hundredth challenge, and I’ve had so many ideas for how to use it. Practicality must come before sheer play, however, so I’m first applying the palette to cards for my grandmothers for Grandparents Day, which is Sunday, September 9.

Memento Toffee Crunch makes a good Kraft, and Memento Morocco stamped twice makes a good Persimmon, but I have no ink pads the right shade of blue. The closest I could get to Blue Yonder is VersaColor Atlantic, and that’s a bit too purple, and I have nothing at all near Blue Breeze. (A good range of blue ink cubes is next on my crafty wish list.) I’ve had a sheet of persimmon paper hanging around these past few weeks, hoping for a home on a card, and I found a light blue scrap of cardstock in my stash that’s near enough to Blue Breeze to round out the palette.

I also followed this week’s sketch challenge, and the circle element gave me a good way to ground and form the floral cluster. I’m still rubbish at arranging flowers—it takes me hours to find something that looks pleasing—but it’s so much easier to fiddle and find the right arrangement now that I have dies for them. Taking inspiration from Inge Groot and some other MFT designers, I went with white leaves, and I really like the simple silhouette look they give to a card.

Supplies
Stamps:  WPlus9 “Fresh Cut Florals”;  Hero Arts “Many Everyday Messages” (sentiment)
Dies:  WPlus9 “Fresh Cut Florals”;  My Favorite Things “Fab Foliage”, “A2 Stitched Rectangle STAX Set 1” (¾” x 2”);  Hero Arts “Nesting Circle Infinity Dies” (2.25” circle)
Ink:  VersaColor Atlantic, Smoke Blue;   Memento Morocco, Love Letter, Toffee Crunch
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Kraft, cheap light blue cardstock and persimmon origami paper from my stash
Miscellanea:  Scotch Permanent Double-Sided Tape, liquid glue

Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”

MFT Summer School: Monochromatic

Since I was running out of time last night to complete the second session of My Favorite Things Summer School, I abandoned my plans for a more elaborate take on a monochrome card, pulled out my dies, and whipped this up. The die-cut panel lets the colored cardstock base show through, and an auxiliary sentiment in matching ink finishes it off.

With that, I have graduated from the second session of Summer School.

Supplies
Stamps:  Hero Arts “Stamp and Cut: Hello” (sentiment)
Dies:  My Favorite Things “A2 Stitched Rectangle STAX Set 2” (4 x 5 ¼);  Hero Arts “Stamp and Cut: Hello” (sentiment)
Ink:  Hero Arts Butter Bar
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Stamper’s Select White, Lemon Tart
Miscellanea:  Scotch Permanent Double-Sided Tape, liquid glue

Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”

MFT Summer School: Visual Triangle

For the visual triangle challenge of MFT Summer School, I balanced different colors and shapes in multiple triangles throughout a floral arrangement. There’s a triangle of purple, of coral four-petal flowers, and of one shape of stamped leaves. In a much looser sense, the Fab Foliage die-cuts behind the rectangle form a triangle as well, since they are concentrated in the top left corner, bottom edge, and right side.

This was my first chance to use the Fab Foliage dies, and I loved it. Even with only one use, I can tell that they’re well on their way to becoming a staple for me.

I’m also entering this card in MFT’s Birthday Project.

Supplies
Stamps:  WPlus9 “Fresh Cut Florals”;  Papertrey Ink “Keep It Simple: Birthday II” (sentiment)
Dies:  My Favorite Things “A2 Stitched Rectangle STAX Set 2” (1 ⅞” x 3 ⅛”), “Fab Foliage”;  WPlus9 “Fresh Cut Florals”
Ink:  Simon Says Stamp Dusty Sage;  Hero Arts Field Greens, Soft Cantaloupe, Pale Tomato;  Memento Lulu Lavender, Sweet Plum, Elderberry
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Stamper’s Select White
Miscellanea:  Scotch Permanent Double-Sided Tape, liquid glue

Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”

MFT Summer School: Rainbow

For the rainbow challenge from MFT Summer School, I whipped up a super-simple graphic card. I love sans serif fonts for designs like these—really, I just love simple cards that rely entirely on a good font. My stamping platform enabled me to stamp in precise increments and make sure each word had adequate ink coverage; I’d never be able to do designs like this without a platform!

Employing the graphic design principle of using lighter colors for weightier fonts and darker colors for thinner fonts to achieve visual balance, I selectively inked the stamp in a jewel-tone rainbow on the left and a pastel rainbow on the right. I love ink cubes—full-size ink pads are so unwieldy!—but Memento’s dewdrop design is unequaled. The difference between the dewdrops and the cubes was starkly apparent using them together like this; the dewdrops offer so much more precision, and they’re much easier to grip and maneuver.

Supplies
Stamps:  Papertrey Ink “Keep It Simple: Thank You I”
Ink:  Memento Teal Zeal, Grape Jelly, Lulu Lavender, Love Letter, Morocco, Peanut Brittle, Olive Grove, Pistachio;  Hero Arts Cotton Candy, Soft Cantaloupe, Butter Bar;  VersaColor Celadon, Atlantic;  Brilliance Mediterranean Blue
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Stamper’s Select White

Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”

MFT Summer School: Focal Point & MFT Sketch Challenge #398

This week, I’m playing along with the second session of My Favorite Things Summer School 2018. For the focal point challenge, I’m using sketch #398, since those circles provide great little windows to highlight the focal point of the card.

I backed the windows with paper I colored with the chisel end of a Copic to create subtle texture, then I popped up the front panel to create a dimensional shadow that emphasizes the focal images. Since I don’t have a realism-accurate color for the bluejay, I layered four different pigment and dye inks, using both second-generation stamping and double stamping, to get a blue that was neither too dark and bold (as it would have been if I had used only Mediterranean Blue), nor too unsaturated and grey (as it would have been if I had used only Atlantic). The birds are elevated from the front panel as well as the card base, and to create depth and visual interest I adhered the cardinal’s branch to the base but the bluejay’s branch to the front panel.

Supplies
Stamps:  Papertrey Ink “Winter Woods” (birds);  Hero Arts “Stamp and Cut: Thanks” (sentiment)
Dies:  Papertrey Ink “Winter Woods” (birds, branch), “Double-Ended Banners”;  Hero Arts “Nesting Circle Infinity Dies” (1.25” circle)
Ink:  Brilliance Rocket Red, Mediterranean Blue, Graphite Black;   VersaColor Atlantic, Cyan;  Memento Teal Zeal
Copics:  BG000
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Stamper’s Select White, copy paper
Miscellanea:  Scotch Permanent Double-Sided Tape, liquid glue, Elmer’s foam mounting squares

Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”

PTI’s “Create Along With Us” Challenge, August 2018

My favorite card from this month’s PTI release was Lizzie’s using the “Frame It Out: Many Blessings” wreath. I was particularly smitten with the color scheme she used—I have recently discovered a fondness for persimmon, even though I don’t tend to care for oranges in general.

For my entry into the August Create Along with Us challenge, I wove together six dogwood branches from PTI’s “Spring Woods” set to create my own wreath, which ended up being a little more sprayed and star-shaped than rounded. However, I managed to get the circle even, so I’m content with it for a first attempt at a wreath.

Since I don’t have a suitable orange shade of ink, I layered a second-generation impression of Memento’s Love Letter with two first-generation impressions of Memento’s Morocco, with satisfactory results. The brown I incorporated into the branches, but since I don’t have anything resembling PTI’s Ocean Tides (such a lovely color), I opted to leave that out. I did test a branch with leaves in VersaColor Celadon, but I preferred the look of the cream leaves—more subtle, less visually distracting. Since the wreath is already so busy, I forwent a sentiment. I only glued down the center of the wreath, leaving the ends of the branches free and able to be curled up slightly for dimension and visual interest.


Supplies
Stamps & Dies:  Papertrey Ink “Spring Woods”
Ink:  Memento Morocco, Love Letter;  VersaFine Vintage Sepia
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Vintage Cream
Miscellanea:  liquid glue, paintbrush, Press’n Seal

Dimensions
5.5” x 5.5”

MFT Sketch Challenge #393 & Color Challenge #97

For this week’s sketch challenge, I created a simple one-layer card with the sentiment and image forming the horizontal line across the center of the sketch.

Since the color palette was so pastel, black ink was too stark for the cupcake outline; the Copic-friendly Memento Toffee Crunch worked well instead and played as a darker shade of the tan included in the palette. My inks have less shade variation between them than the peach and coral in the palette do, but the hearts are a darker coral than the sentiment, although the shimmer makes the difference harder to distinguish.

Supplies
Stamps:  My Favorite Things “Hog Heaven” (cupcake);  Papertrey Ink “Just Desserts Sentiments” (sentiment);  Lawn Fawn “Winter Alpaca” (hearts)
Ink:  Memento Toffee Crunch;  Hero Arts Soft Cantaloupe (sentiment), Fresh Peach (hearts)
Copics:  R22, Y00, E30
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Stamper’s Select White
Miscellanea:  Spectrum Noir Sparkle clear

Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”

MFT Summer School: White Space

For the first challenge of My Favorite Things Summer School, white space, I knew exactly what I wanted to do. Last Christmas, the cards I made with the word die from the Hero Arts “Stamp and Cut: Joy” set left me with a bunch of petal-shaped gold pieces from cutting the negative space inside the loops of the letters, and I’d been meaning to make a flower with them. My grandmother’s birthday is in a few weeks, and a simple, gold-and-cream flower card seemed just the thing.

It took me a few iterations to figure out how to arrange the petals in the most appealing way, and the layout feels a little too empty, but there weren’t enough leftover pieces to make a second, smaller flower. I probably would have been better off making the design symmetrical on a vertical layout, but I really liked the notion of having the flower in the lower right. A scattering of sequins might help balance the layout, but I haven’t a sequin or rhinestone to my name, so spare and simple it shall be.

With this, my fifth project, I have completed all of the challenges from the first session of My Favorite Things Summer School 2018.

Supplies
Stamps:  Papertrey Ink “Keep It Simple: Birthday II” (sentiment)
Ink:  Brilliance Galaxy Gold
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Vintage Cream (base), Recollections “Paper Flowers” cardstock pack (gold cardstock)
Miscellanea:  liquid adhesive

Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”

MFT Summer School: Repetition

I’d seen these two cards on Pinterest recently, so when I was sifting through my supplies to determine what I’d do for the My Favorite Things Summer School challenges, the simple bird silhouettes came to mind as something that would work well for the third challenge, repetition.

I couldn’t decide which color I liked better for the birds, a row of just turquoise or a row of alternating red and blue, so I did both. For dimension, I stacked three die-cuts on the turquoise card, but only two on the red-and-blue card, since the hearts added a tiny third layer.

The hearts on the red and blue birds are partially inspired by a clock that used to hang in my parents’ nursery once upon a time: it had a border of hearts in these exact shades of red and blue, so when I saw the paper colors together, the heart motif immediately sprang to mind. I had already been thinking about die-cutting hearts in the turquoise birds, however, so the design choice isn’t entirely attributable to the clock. The heart die that comes with Lawn Fawn’s “Hedgehugs” mini set is the perfect tiny size for this sort of thing; I’ve used it even more than I have the adorable hedgehogs.

In addition to submitting these cards to the MFT Summer School: Repetition category, I’m linking up to Simon Says Stamp’s Wednesday challenge “Red, White, and/or Blue” and their June “Work It Wednesday” challenge.

Supplies
Stamps:  My Favorite Things “Hog Heaven” (sentiment)
Dies:  Papertrey Ink “Spring Woods” (indeterminate finch/sparrow), Lawn Fawn “Hedgehugs” (heart)
Ink:  Memento Gray Flannel
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Stamper’s Select White, cheap layering-weight turquoise, dusty blue, and dark red from stash
Miscellanea:  Scotch Permanent Double-Sided Tape, liquid glue

Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”

MFT Summer School: Complementary Colors & MFT Sketch Challenge #392

This week, I’m participating in the My Favorite Things Wednesday Sketch Challenge #392 as well as the first 2018 session of MFT Summer School.

The fourth Summer School challenge is to use complementary colors. Everyone else seemed to be using bright primary and secondary colors for their complementary pair, but the range of complementary colors covers so much more than just those six, and I wanted to do something different. I gravitate towards tertiary and quaternary colors, earth tones, and desaturated colors, so I tackled the project with those in mind. I pulled up a color wheel and messed around with combinations, tones, and shades for a while, then narrowed down my options.

My ink and marker selection is fairly limited still and tends towards the brighter end of the spectrum, which didn’t suit the vibe I was going for, and the sketch seemed like a good way to use a bit of my profusion of 12x12 patterned paper. I bought several pads online years ago and only realized when they arrived that the reason stores sell 6x6 pads is because 12x12 patterns are enormous and don’t usually fit on A2 card fronts. Online, there was no indication that the pattern scale differed; I thought I was just getting more paper! Now I don’t know if I shall ever use it up.

In flipping through my paper pads, I was smitten with the notion of pairing a dark, desaturated red floral pattern with the green as well, so I went ahead and made two cards, using the patterned paper first as a prototype to figure out what I wanted to do with the sketch.

For the second card and my main complementary color pair, I chose dark red-violet and light yellow-green, then threw in a bit of gold since the papers read more purple and green together. I broke out my VersaMark cube and created my own tone-on-tone floral pattern, and since I had a better idea of what I wanted out of the layout, I was able to simplify things more to my tastes.

Supplies
Stamps:  Papertrey Ink “Happy Trails” (“just a note”), WPlus9 “Fresh Cut Florals” (“thinking of you”), Stampin’ Up “I Like You” (flowers)
Ink:  Brilliance Galaxy Gold, VersaMark
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Vintage Cream (bases), The Paper Studio “Affinity” pattern paper pack and “Affinity” textured paper pack, Stampin’ Up Blackberry Bliss, Recollections “Paper Flowers” cardstock pack (gold cardstock), cheap layering-weight cream and dark red from stash
Miscellanea:  Scotch Permanent Double-Sided Tape, Papertrey Ink “Double-Ended Banners” die

Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”

Sweet Birthday Florals

A friend of mine has a birthday this week, and this card is already on its way to her.

I took inspiration for the color scheme from her Tumblr and her artwork, and I chose these clustered blooms since they were the closest thing I had to hydrangeas, which are some of her favorite flowers. Since I don’t have the dies for this set (yet!), I had to mask the flowers. I’m not very good at arranging florals yet, and it’s particularly difficult without die-cuts, so I kept things simple. The masking left a white halo around some of the images, so I used a cotton swab cut down to a point and smushed on my ink pad to dab color into the gaps.

The pitcher is from an entirely different floral set by Clearly Besotted. I stamped it once in Simon Says Stamp Fog ink, which isn’t Copic-friendly, so the outline blurred a little when I colored in the pitcher with the lightest warm gray Copic. Once I finished coloring, I stamped over the outline twice with the Fog ink to give the pitcher a crisp edge again. (Huzzah for the invention of the stamp platform, which makes such things possible!)

I used a quilting ruler, a mechanical pencil, and a paper trimmer to measure and cut the panels on the front of the card so the floral arrangement would be perfectly centered without being too cramped and without having too much white space and so the matte would have a quarter-inch border. For a focal panel that large, a smaller matte would have looked a bit odd unless I had used two mattes, both large and small, and there just wasn’t enough room on the card base for that.

Of course, I had to make a matching envelope. I’m not entirely pleased with how the arrangement of the leaves turned out, but you can only fuss for so long before you have to commit.

Serendipitously, this week’s Simon Says Stamp Wednesday Challenge is “Anything Goes” featuring WPlus9. I had planned out this card back in May, but I only had the time to make it this past weekend — which makes it eligible to enter in the challenge.


Supplies
Stamps:  WPlus9 “Fresh Cut Florals” (all florals);  Clearly Besotted “Simple Silhouettes” (pitcher);  Papertrey Ink “Just Desserts Sentiments” (sentiment)
Ink:  VersaColor Smoke Blue, Atlantic, Celadon;  Hero Arts Cotton Candy, Pale Tomato;  Memento Toffee Crunch;  Simon Says Stamp Fog
Copics:  W00
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Stamper’s Select White
Miscellanea:  Scotch Permanent Double-Sided Tape, Post-It Labeling Tape (for masking), cotton swab


Dimensions
base:  4 ¹/₄”  x  5 ¹/₂”
focal panel:  2 ⁹/₁₆”  x  4”
matte:  3 ¹/₈”  x  4 ¹/₂”

PTI’s Make It Monday #326: Inchies

The theme for Papertrey Ink’s Make It Monday this week excited me, since I like working with inchies. There’s so much you can do with the design element, but I like to keep it clean and simple.

Inchies make an ideal ground for the writing-related stamps from PTI’s retired “Happy Trails” set. I bought the set primarily for this sentiment — I love the design and the font combination — but I hadn’t had a chance to use it yet and couldn’t resist the opportunity.

The color scheme isn’t meant to be patriotic; dark red and dark blue merely suited the theme of writing implements. It’d be fun to do this again using sepia tones. I think that flecked paper, such as PTI’s Rustic Cream or Rustic White or WPlus9’s Oatmeal, would look even better than the plain cream, but this was all I had on hand.

One of the top items on my wish list is a set of square dies, and I was a little worried I wouldn’t be able to get the inchies uniform without them, but with a paper trimmer and a great deal of precision, I managed. My transparent quilting ruler was indispensable for lining things up, though a T-square would be just as handy.


Supplies
Stamps:  Papertrey Ink “Happy Trails”
Ink:  Memento Nautical Blue;  Hero Arts Red Royal;  Tsukineko Brilliance Graphite Black
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Vintage Cream
Miscellanea:  Scotch Permanent Double-Sided Tape, cardstock scraps layered for dimension


Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”

PTI’s “Create Along With Us” Challenge, June 2018

Papertrey Ink’s design team produced a bunch of great projects for the June release, but I particularly liked Lizzie’s “Reef Builder” card. For this month’s Create Along With Us challenge, I took inspiration from the color scheme and the banner that she used. Since I particularly wanted a sans serif font to go with the clean lines of the houses, by sheer coincidence I ended up using a similar sentiment as well.

I’ve only had the “Spring Hills” set for about four months, but I’ve already used it on at least eight projects: the sentiments are more versatile than I anticipated, and the houses are an awful lot of fun to play with. It’s a pity that “Summer Hills” is sold out, because I’d love to get more of these little houses.

Supplies
Stamps:  Papertrey Ink “Keep It Simple: Thank You I” (sans serif), “Spring Hills” (house)
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black, Nautical Blue
Copics:  R22, R27;  Stampin’ Up Stampin’ Blendabilities: Old Olive light, Old Olive dark, Daffodil Delight dark;  Bic Marking Yellow Blaze
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Stamper’s Select White
Miscellanea:  Scotch Permanent Double-Sided Tape, Papertrey Ink “Double-Ended Banners” die


Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”

My Favorite Things Sketch Challenge #388 & Color Challenge #94

Over the past few days, I saw the My Favorite Things Wednesday Sketch Challenge #388 pop up on a couple of different blogs I follow, and I went, “I could do that!” The smallness of my craft supply stash is inversely proportional to the excitement I feel when I see a challenge that I could complete with supplies that I already own. In other words, I was ridiculously excited to own a banner die this week.

Since I’m submitting to the MFT sketch challenge, I went ahead and followed the MFT Color Challenge #94 too — it fits the theme of my images wonderfully. (Cherries aren’t naturally peach, but hey, it looks cute. That’s what counts, right?)

I covered the icing on the cupcakes with shimmer pen, but glitter is notoriously hard to photograph and that proved true once more.

In addition to entering the MFT challenges, I’m submitting the card to Simon Says Stamp’s Work It Wednesday: the theme this month is summer, and this color palette reminds me of beach-themed decor.


Supplies
Stamps:  My Favorite Things “Hog Heaven” (pig with cupcake, solo cupcake);  Papertrey Ink “Just Desserts Sentiments” (sentiment)
Ink:  Memento Tuxedo Black;  Hero Arts Soft Cantaloupe, Fresh Peach (layered)
Copics:  R000, R20, B00, Y00;  Stampin’ Up Stampin’ Blendabilities: Costal Cabana light, Calypso Coral light
Paper:  Papertrey Ink Stamper’s Select White; cheap layering-weight ice blue from stash
Miscellanea:  Scotch Permanent Double-Sided Tape, Papertrey Ink “Double-Ended Banners” die, Pilot Precise V5 in turquoise (sprinkles), Spectrum Noir Sparkle clear


Dimensions
4.25” x 5.5”