MFT July Color Challenge

This has been on my mind.  Why do I always wait til the end of the month to do these color challenges.  They seem to be the most difficult challenge for me.  I think because my brain thinks in large chunks and I just can’t see that many colors all on one tiny card.  But I’m learning.  I incorporated all four of the colors here and it doesn’t look busy or overwhelming at all.
Thought process: besides the obvious colors of the challenge…I have been seeing lots of balloons showing up and wanted to use a balloon theme.  The other thing I wanted to use a MFT image.
I have been seeing the ads for Stretch Your Stamps class, I could probably be an instructor for that the way I change my stamps around. LOL.  This little gal was holding a bouquet of tulips. The tulip season is long past us and I thought I could use the Blueprints #5 dies to give her a bouquet of ballons.  I love how this turned out.
A bit of water coloring with Distress Markers (big learning curve with those) not mastered yet. So here she is, already for the July MFT color challenge posting.  I will also enter this into Simon Says Wednesday Challenge: Emboss It. 


All MFT die cuts. 
Cuttlebug Embossing Folder
hand cut bow for ballons

Stamp 265 MFT sketch

Gahhh!! Just getting this in under the wire.  I had in my mind to do this as soon as I got back from CO but lethargy took over and I digi-scrapped instead.  It seemed easier on my brain.  This is due posted on MFT site in two hours.

Wednesday Sketch Challenge #186  My mom needs a card.  She is home from the hospital and rehab and is itching like crazy with the shingles.  I thought this would put a smile on her face.  She loves doggies.

Image and sentiment is from MFT Hang in There (picked it up on super bargain sale) love when that happens.   Die cuts are MFT Blueprints 16.   So the little ring around the puppy….when I cut the circle die, I see it has two stitched lines around it but so disappointed when I cut it out, only one of the stitched circles show on the die and the other is in the negative part of the paper.  so sad.   Hmmm, what to do?  I found a plain circle die similar in size and very carefully taped it over the stitching that was in the negative portion of scrap paper and YES it worked.  Now I have my double stitching.

I colored my image with distress markers and water brush.  I am liking that water brush more and more. so simple. I thought the wood grain behind would be significant of a dog house. 

 

a gift from a friend

an online friend gifted me with this cute image.  I wanted to do one last card before I leave for Colorado this afternoon.  I am hoping Lee Murphy and I will be able to hook up for coffee or dinner.  (luvlee on SCS) 

I so wanted to play in the MFT sketch challenge for last week and Whew…I got it done.  My thought process was simply to use orange as I have seen so much of that popping up on cards across the cyber stamping world.

Using all MFT dies and sentiment, I quickly came up with this.  That’s the joy of using sketches.  The card is mostly done for you.    MFT Sketch 185 if you never have played hop on over and join the fun.   I used the rick rack as a butterfly trail to land on the nose of this cutie.

Stamp 264 Deconstructed Sketch

Deconstructed Sketch is being sponsored by MFT this week.  I wanted to join in. You can click HERE to see the details and join in.

I flipped the sketch like this.  I had water colored this sweet bear a couple of days ago and wanted to give him a home.  This sketch worked perfectly for him.  Where the point is on the sketch that looks like an envelope; I let the fish tail over hand the die cut to adhere to the sketch.

I couldn’t get the fly and hook sticker to work on the bottom of the sketch so I put it up in the above corner.  I liked the look of the single Candie element off in the right hand corner.  I found this very neat roll of twine at a thrift store.  LOTS and LOTS of it for $1.00.  I love those finds and it works perfectly with this image and back ground paper.

The image is from Darcie stamps and is retired.  Colored with SU markers and water brush. The dies are from MFT used to cut the panel the bear is on and the patterened paper.

WOYWW

WHAT’S ON YOUR WORKDESK WEDNESDAY?  It’s a disaster that’s for sure.  But summer is for being gone and crafting in between, even if it means crafting on top of all the stuff you left out from the previous project.  I do need to clean it up today as a new friend is coming over and I don’t want her to have a bad impression of stamping.    She will find that out soon enough on her own.

Lets see, from left to right.  That’s the stamp that created the bear that is now colored.  Two sets of MFT stamps and sentiments.  The large argyle stamp is on my press plate.  I am trying a new watercolor paper by Northwoods and thus the water brush , tombow markers, and mini distress inks.   Most everything else is leftover from the card I created last night.  That compass stamp (that looks like a pocket watch) is a recent clearance purchase from Michaels.  The alcohol solvent is in a bottle behind it.  I don’t know why all those wood block stamps are out yet. and the washi tape I think I used a month ago.  as I am typing this, I think I see the need to get this cleaned up.  Later Taters.

Won’t you join us and see what other crafty people have on their desks?  Click here to see or to join in the fun.

Stamp 263-a brand new one

Inkadinkado makes some really cool stamps.  I don’t have many of theirs but this was on clearance at Michaels and I don’t have much in the masculine line for stamps.  Simon Says Wednesday challenge is CLEARLY.  I have stamped this image with StazOn on stiff acrylic (from packaging material) and cut it out.  I then took Ranger Alcohol ink in Wild Lettuce and added a touch of solvent with it.  I did that on my craft mat and then smeared it around a bit and laid the BACK side of the acrylic piece into it to give it a bit of color and old world look.  I already had the library cardstock cut with the wonky MFP die from BluePrints 16.  I distressed it with Peeled Paint distress ink and also the panel under it.  I distressed the edges of that bottom piece.

I hand wrote the book title and date but it was still looking a bit bare when I laid the cut out acrylic compass on it.  Using London Fog Memento ink I used that Argyle large stamp for some interest.  Stamped the MFT sentiment.  I popped up the entire panel onto the kraft cardstock and added some twine.  That bottom corner still looked a bit bare, I saw my note pad sitting there and thought a page number clipped to this would be a good finishing touch. 

I love the end result.  It can be a birthday card, a Glad for your promotion, new job, or grad card.  All bases covered with this one.

Stamp #262 My Favorite Things

Entering this into MFT Sketch 184 challenge.  So fun to create with a sketch.  I was in a bit of a hurry today as something unexpectedly fun came up and I have to pack and leave soon.  But I had just started on this and wanted to finish it.  I love this cute little Pure Innocence gal that is a recent purchase from MFT’s rummage sale.  

The Tim Holtz banners were a real steal on clearance at Michaels, I have a feeling I will get a lot of use out of that die.  love the wiggly edges on them.

I used Coredinations card stock in order to distress the banners. The other die cuts are all MFT. 

Here’s the sketch.   . 

Finally back in the stamp room Stamp#261 SU

I had a recent request for some anniversary cards and I realized I should get a few of those made up and in the stash.  I still had paper left after making the required cards and went ahead and made this one. 

I overlaid the designer paper with a piece of heavy vellum from SU to soften it a bit and then built from there. 

The large heart is slightly embossed.  I ran it through the Big Shot with an embossing folder and then ran it through again to flatten it so it has texture but not really heavy embossing.  It went better with the softness of the image that way. 

The dies are all from My Favorite Things excep the mini hearts which is Simon Says.

I used washi tape on the top to cove the obvious glue line left by the scor tape I used to adhere the vellum panel.  The Sentiment is stamped with Staz On.  It’s the only thing that works for me on Vellum.  I seem to always smear my Brialliance ink when I use it on vellum.

Making my own Embellishments

The challenge at Simon for Monday July 7th is to Start from Scratch.  Well this wasn’t SO very creative but it was from scratch.  I made this cute thank you card for our friends who had an POWERFUL display of fireworks and invited us over to watch it with them and their families.  It was a BLAST, literally!  So fun to watch the kids playing with sparklers and the display of in the sky stuff was as good as the one the town puts on.

Anyway back to the embellishments.  I used my dies from My Favorite things to make my own sequins.  I glammed them up a bit by adding Wink of Stella so they look like the real thing.  I also made my own sticker as we celebrated Nancy’s birthday on the fifth with the fireworks.  I took a star and colored inside the open part and then added the number 5 from a die cut and used white gel pen to highlight it, it looks a bit like stitching.  This pulled together pretty easily with some very old stickers that I have on hand.  I am little by little using some of them up. 

I also get a lot of mileage out of Simon Says Mini hearts die.  I think I use that die more than any that I own.  And I used Kristina Werners technique of the white gel pen dashes around the edges.