Hero Arts, Imaginisce, and Merry Monday

I started this card last night working on the flower.  It is a clear stamp from Imaginisce - it also has the little holiday sentiment I used on last week's holiday card.  I stamped it on watercolor paper and embossed with brown embossing powder.  I then grabbed my distress inks and perfect pearls mist.  Swiped the inks on my mat, spritzed on some perfect pearls and started painting the poinsettia.  I just kept adding layers.  I wanted it to look very vintage.  The perfect pearls adds such a nice shimmer.  Each layer of the poinsettia was pop dotted on the card front.  I added the brownish pearl to the center.  The paper is an old collection from Cosmo Cricket - but it has some great papers in it.  The sentiment is by Hero Arts - three sentiments in the set - I think it will be one of my better purchases - I will get lots of use out of it for holiday cards for Operation Write Home.

The card is based on the Merry Monday Sketch Challenge on Always Playing With Paper.

Have a wonderful day - we will see if I can get the card that is in my head out onto the drawing board tonight.

Eat Cake Graphics and Stamp Techniques

A very simple card tonight.  The card was made with with this stamp from Eat Cake Graphics -
7005-I Coneflowers.  I always have coneflowers in my flower garden in the summer.  They are usually pink though - can you can see a card I made using this same stamp - colored with copics at this link.

A few months ago I took an online class from Jennifer McGuire and it was such great fun - I got to get all inky.  One of the things we learned to do was to stamp on canvas - I embossed with white embossing powder on the cream colored canvas.  I then colored the image with Tim Holtz distress inks and Pearl Ex spray mist.  You can pick up a little of the shine.  The card is very simple - I just wanted to highlight the stamped image on the canvas.

This canvas was sticky back canvas that comes in the ATC size.  You can also use regular canvas you buy in the fabric store - very inexpensive - lots of fun in a small piece of fabric - most canvas is 60 inches wide. 

Well I am taking another online class - this one is one using your die cuts and Silhouette Cameo - lots of fun - I haven't done much. 

Everyone have a wonderful evening.

Sympathy Cards

I find that Sympathy cards are so difficult to make - and they are not a card I can make ahead of time.  I do try to make them somewhat personal.  I struggled for several days making this card and I don't know if I am totally happy with it yet. 

I love the background.  I stamped the Hero Arts background stamp in VersaMark and then clear embossed it.  I then rubbed distress inks over it - Blues and greens - to try and give it a tealish color.  I matted it with a dark navy metallic paper.  The sentiment - another Hero Arts Stamp - was stamped on a scrap of the patterned paper I stamped the background on.  It was matted with the navy blue also.  I had this Bazzill bling paper that picked up the blue/green undertones.  The background and sentiment are both pop dotted. 

The flower is made from coffee filters which I cut out with spellbinders - there are four layers of four different sizes that make up the flower.  I colored the coffee filters with distress inks and Perfect Pearl Mists.  I bunched them all up - put a rubber band around them and let them dry for 24 hours.  The ribbon is from my friend Ivanka.

Moxie Fab World has a challenge to use household items on a card - well coffee filters are a household item.  The actually make great flowers and take color from many different mediums.  I will also place it in the Hero Arts monthly challenge for flowers.

Now I need to finish the inside of the card.  I think I then need to just make a card that is not so difficult to design.  Do you struggle making sympathy cards?