Caring Hearts (and Pineapples) Post #4

G'day crafty friends, and Happy November!

It's a new month and a new challenge on the Paper Smooches blog.

The requirement for this challenge is to use gold. This weekend I was working on more card-kit preparation, for the Caring Hearts Card Drive. 

 My work-shoppers will be making this lovely card:

How delicious is that red poinsettia? It is a Paper Smooches die, cut from red suede paper, from Paper Wishes. The Christmas words embossing folder is another Paper Wishes product. I used pearlescent vellum for the embossed layer, and set it over gold-coloured card stock. The centre of the poinsettia is embellished with gold Liquid Pearls, which were also scattered over the card-front. Lastly, I added a loose bow of gold embroidery thread.

I hope you are making cards for the Drive, too! Check out all the details, using the link above, or look through my earlier Caring Hearts posts.

Have a creative week,

Caroline

Warm Smooches

 Good evening, crafty friends.

I've got a little energy by the end of this weekend, recovering from a cold.

It's been awhile since I played along with any challenges. I couldn't resist trying out my new Birch Trees dies from Paper Smooches. So many lovely creations using these dies, on the PS blog!

So this card is being entered in the Paper Smooches SPARKS challenge: "Anything Goes."

 I also liked the look of this week's sketch from Freshly Made Sketches, #208.

Here's my version:

I used the birch trees as the vertical element, and planted them on some wonderful new papers from Close to My Heart, "White Pines."  The stamp for the sentiment and those mittens is also from Paper Smooches,  Warm Hearts + matching icon dies.

I used the second birch tree on the inside of the card, colouring the cardinal with Copic markers.

That's it for now.

Come back later this week, for some more news on the Caring Hearts Drive 2015. Hopefully you are making lots of cards to send to seniors in nursing homes and residences, to brighten up their holiday.

Happy crafting,

Caroline

Birthday Cards

I've been following the newest Online Card Class: Stretch Your Dies.

Lots of great ideas! They inspired me to get caught up on my family birthday card stash. Don't worry, the intended recipients do not read my blog!

Here's the first:

Beautiful Bokeh background with Distress Inks and white pigment ink, plus home-made circle stencil. Then, those lucious-looking letters! These were inspired by Jennifer McGuire. The letters were white card-stock, cut with Avery Elle alpha dies, coloured with Distress Markers and inks to match the card, glossed with Wink of Stella, then covered with Liquid Glass for that shimmery, shiny effect.

Next up, one for my niece. This card is a shameless CASE of Laura Bassen. I used my rubber embossing mats to make the Polaroid impression with a Lil' Inker's die.  I masked off the edge, and stamped a photo-bomb scene, using Paper Smooches Chubby Chum Pals. Those were coloured with Copic Markers.

For the sentiment, I blended two Copic colours from the scene above, then die-cut the letters from Paper Smooches Sassy Script.

I tried a couple different colour combos before deciding on the blue and brown. Lining the dies up with washi tape helped keep them straight, even when using the magnetic platform.

One more view:

I am linking these up to:

And the Online Card Classes' gallery.

Have a crafty week!

Caroline

Neat, Tangled and Water-coloured

I seem to be in Valentine's mode, still. Or at least still in love with hearts...

Neat & Tangled's challenge this month is to watercolour.

The N&T design team is also teaming up with Cosmo Cricket this week, to showcase a new CC product: colour-ready paper. It has embossed images; all you need do is add ink or watercolor (or both) for some spectacular but simple-to-do results.

Following along those lines, I played with Neat & Tangles Tiny Triangles background stamp.

Today's card has the triangles heat-embossed in white, with a watercolour wash over top, in shades of pink, merging with red and yellow.

 

The upside down triangles made me think of little hearts, so I punched some tiny ones from water-colour paper scraps, tinted them with the same Distress Inks, and mounted them over triangles of the matching colours.

I like the cascading effect.

Go check out Neat & Tangled's blog for more watercolor inspiration.

Happy crafting,

Caroline

Supplies:

Watercolor card stock- Michaels

Cardstock in Honey, Hollyhock and Baby Pink- Close to My Heart

Distress Inks in Spun Sugar, Victorian Velvet, Fired Brick and Wild Honey- Ranger

Small heart die- Paper Smooches

Stitched rectangle die- Lil'Inker designs

And she's back...

I believe this is my first post of 2015!

Sorry to have been MIA the past few weeks. Truth be told, I was a bit burnt out with crafting and blogging after taking on a bigger role in the Caring Hearts Card Drive this year. Lots of work right up until Christmas. Then the holidays themselves, with three adult boys home and parents and sister visiting from out of town.  Plus, I started another contract at work January 5th, and am now working full time for the first time in YEARS. Not sure how everyone else manages it :) I now go to the gym for 7:00 a.m. and do everything else after work or on the weekend. Not a lot of time or energy left-over for creativity...

I DID get to go to my annual scrapbooking retreat with my besties in Wisconsin in January. SUCH a good time. It felt so good to re-connect with my gals, and to remember how much I love scrapbooking.  I'll be sharing a few lay-outs here in the next few weeks.

But today is all about Paper Smooches and Valentine's Day.

Kim Hughes is celebrating four years in business, with lots of extra fun on the PS blog.

I made my Valentine cards this year using the goodies from Jen Sherkus' "Monster Hugs" kit. But I had to get inky for THIS CHALLENGE:

I've been having fun making patterned paper with embossed images and Distress Inks. I learned this technique from the very talented Heather Telford.

Here's the process:

Heat-emboss assorted PS heart images on 5.5" x 4.25" card stock. Blend two-to-three colours of Distress Ink over the embossed images, using a foam tool.  I used Worn Lipstick, Tattered Rose and Gathered Twigs (thinking of roses, chocolate and kisses!). Splatter the panel with water and spritz with Ranger Perfect Pearls Mist. Dry it and add more stamped images in the distress ink colours. Here's a close up of the final effect:

 I then cut the panel into three smaller pieces and used them to make three LOVE U cards.

 This one uses the PS Love die, the U from the new Sassy Script stamp set, and some Pretty Pink Posh sequins.

Number two uses a sentiment from the PS Fancy Frames stamp set, and the heart border from the PS Heart Dies. I used Worn Lipstick to custom colour my row of little hearts. Looking at this photo, I realize I glued my panel on UPSIDE DOWN!

This one's a little over the top, but fun! I cut a stitched heart (Lil'Inker Dies, as is the new stitched rectangle mat) from the panel, and mounted it over matching card stock. The "thanks" is another PS die; I sponged more Worn Lipstick onto white card stock in a gradient of colour before cutting out the sentiment.

A satisfying afternoon's work!  Beats being outside today...-34 C.  Brrr!

Make sure to check out the Paper Smooches blog for more fun and inspiration!

Happy crafting,

Caroline

Caring Hearts...♥

Happy Saturday, crafty friends!

Collection for the Caring Hearts Card Drive 2014 ended yesterday.

Want to know the total number of cards I received, here in Eastern Canada?

936

Wowsers, eh?

Many of the contributors commented on how much they enjoyed making cards for such a good cause, and that they look forward to doing it again next year (yes!). Several mentioned that they held card-making "bees" with their friends. Some asked how to make sure nursing homes in their area receive cards next year. This thing just keeps on growing!

 

As a "depot" I got to admire & enjoy the beautiful designs and top-notch craftsmanship of the cards that arrived. We had contributions from across Canada (British Columbia to Nova Scotia) as well as a few from overseas (France and Australia). Amazing!

I'm going to wait to announce the winner of the prize I mentioned in THIS blog post; Vera will take another week to finish collating all the results and drawing for prizes.

Next week I'll be able to tell you about a special project we have going in Ottawa to deliver the cards to nursing homes... It has an awesome name.

Finally got a little time to craft today, and was inspired by this advertisement:

I used the stripes from the shopping bag, and a new stamp set from Close to My Heart.

Took my trusty Paper Smooches bookmark die, and some platinum embossing powder and voilà.

I love those bright colours sandwiched between the traditional red & green.

This card is being entered in this week's Card Concept challenge: use a tag.

Stay tuned for more Caring Hearts news...

Happy crafting, 

Caroline

Another card for the Caring Hearts Card Drive (post #4)

To comment on my Caring Hearts Card Drive Blog Hop

post, go HERE.

 Bringing you another cute snowman card, which I've reproduced for the Caring Hearts Card Drive, but which features Paper Smooches products, so it's going into this week's challenge:

I've been a little slow to jump on the stencil band-wagon, but I had fun with TWO of them on this card.

First, used a beautiful birch-tree stencil from Club Scrap for the background, then went over that with the Falling Snow stencil from Simon Says with some embossing paste. After removing the stencil, I s sprinkled micro-glitter, which only stuck to the paste "flakes" for some serious shimmer.

The snowy slope was Paper Smooches border dies #1. The heat-embossed sentiment comes from PS Christmas Sampler, and the snow-dude and cardinal (coloured with Copics) are from Warm Hearts.

Go check out the entries at the Paper Smooches Sparks challenge, go follow the Caring Hearts Card Drive Blog Hop and for goodness sake, GO MAKE SOME CARDS for the drive!

Happy crafting,

Caroline

Caring Hearts Card Drive BLOG HOP!

 Good morning, creative peeps!

Are you ready to start your Christmas crafting?

We have a treat for you this morning: inspiration from the Caring Hearts Card Drive.

 Twenty different designers and members of the paper-crafting industry have seasonal holiday projects to share over the next two days.

We hope you will hop along, and leave comments. Not only will you get some great ideas for your own holiday crafting, you will be eligible for prizes!

We also hope you will be inspired to join this year's Caring Hearts Card Drive.

You should have come from the ever delightful Savannah O'Gwynn. Love that girl's crafty mojo! For a complete list of stops, and if you want to start at the beginning of the hop, go to Vera Yates' blog.

The purpose of the Caring Hearts Card Drive, organized by Vera Yates and Jennifer McGuire, is to spread some holiday cheer. Hand-made Christmas or holiday/seasonal cards are collected and delivered to seniors living in nursing homes--little random acts of kindness to brighten lives, at what can be a very lonely time of the year.

I wanted to illustrate both a holiday card and a true Christmas card.

I just loved this Paper Smooches die the first time I saw it. City of Bethlehem sky-line! I created a night-sky with purple and pink Distress inks, liberally sprayed with some Perfect Pearls mist. The gold star was heat-embossed, then highlited with Perfect Pearls gold pigment powder. I "aged" the buildings, with some sponged ink, and back-lit them with yellow paper.  The sentiment is also from Paper Smooches.

The second card is more playful.

Mason jars are a big home decor item right now, so I used the Crystal Clear stamps and dies from Paper Smooches to create a snow-globe shaker card, with white Flower Soft as the snow, instead of glitter or sequins. The snowman image (retired Close to My Heart) is coloured with Copic markers.

Your next stop on the hop is the gifted and generous creator of Verve Stamps, Julee Tilman.

Make sure to comment as you hop; you can leave comments until midnight, CST, Saturday November 8th, 2014. Winners will be chosen randomly--there are some wonderful prizes to be had. So go be inspired,  and then get crafty for a good cause! The Caring Hearts Card Drive ends November 28th, 2014. Lots of time to get creative!

Have a great week,

Caroline

P.S. entering these in the Paper Smooches "Anything Goes" challenge.

Happy Birdday to Ewe...

 Still in the birthday card-making mode.

Here's one I sent to my mum this morning.

She LOVES sheep. Usually stuffed or pictured, vs. running around on the hoof. She does a lot of knitting--not sure if that had anything to do with it.

Anyhoo! 

I purchased this OWH set of cute critters and matching dies back in the summer, with that little sheep in mind for my mom. She attended the Copic certification workshop with me in June, so she'll appreciate the colouring!

Here's the card:

 Water-coloured the background with Distress Ink minis. The sky was sponged on. The grass created by swiping the edge of the inkpad onto the paper, making streaks that were then spritzed with pearlized water to mix and soften them.

I cut apart and mixed the sentiments to create the birthday message, and added a few seagulls to the sky so it made sense!

I sent my mom's birthday gift off earlier (it's the latest book in a fantasy series she follows), so I thought I'd include a book-mark with the card.

This months Simon Says Stamp card kit had just the right ingredients! 

I used my trusty Paper Smooches book-mark die as a base and played around with the papers and stamps from the SSS kit.

Here's the result:

Here's a close-up of the stamped panel. SO MUCH fun to create a bookshelf scene...

And I used the washi tape in the kit as part of the tassel. My mum was a librarian, so she'll love the whole name/date/sign-out thing...

Happy crafting,

Caroline

P.S.:  I'm linking the BDay card up to Seize the Birthday, Anything goes option.

Supplies:

White daisy, Colonial white, Lagoon cardstock, CTMH; Black textured cardstock, Wasau Papers; patterned paper from the SSS kit; water-colour paper, Tim Holtz/Ranger

Hero Arts  "Missing You" stamp set and matching dies

"To thine own shelf be true" stamp set from Simon Says Stamp

Paper Smooches bookmark dies

Stitched rectangle die from Lil' Inker Designs

Ribbon and twine, Michael's

Tuxedo Black Memento Ink pad, Tsuneiko

Distress Ink minis, in Tumbled Glass, Crushed Olive, Forest Moss, Antique Linen, Evergreen Bough: Ranger Industries

Copic markers