Smile

This week, I'm playing along for the first time at Muse Challenge Blog.  Their challenge #9 is created by the extremely talented designer, Marion Vagg, in a gorgeous play on color, stripes, and design.  I would LOVE it if you could stop by their BLOG and vote for my card!  Voting starts at 12 noon EST on Saturday 3/23 and ends 12 noon EST on Sunday 3/24.  I'd really appreciate it!

 These aren't colors that I use often, so I had to dig through my inks and then remembered my Hero Arts shadow inks.  LOVE them!  For the stripe element, I used the new Papertrey Ink set Watercolor Wonder, a very abstract set of "smears" that look handmade.  SO cool.

I experimented with a variety of stamps for the design and remembered my cherished  Hero Arts stamp Fabulous Flourish.  I embossed it in white, keeping the card in landscape, so I could fit the entire stamp on top of the stripes. 

For the sentiment, I chose Hero Arts Made With Love stamp and masked off SMILE, from You Make Me Smile - one of my faves!  I embossed it too, in white.  To finish it off, I added some pearls for a little bling!

I'm also entering this in the Hero Arts Blog monthly challenge.

As always, I enjoy reading your comments.  Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies:

Paper - Hero Arts Layering Papers - Snow, Pool Mixed

Stamps - Hero Arts Fabulous Flourish, Papertrey Ink Watercolor Wonder

Ink - Hero Arts Soft Pool, Pool Mid-Tone, Cornflower Mid-Tone, Memento Blue Danube, VersaMark

Other - Hero Arts White Embossing Powder, Pool Mixed Accents

Lawn Fawn Birthday Mini Hop

Stamp Fever is a charming little store in Orange, California. We carry all things related to the crafting hobbies of stamping, card-making and paper crafting.  We stock a variety of stamps, papers, inks and supplies. We can also provide special orders for items you find online. We offer weekly stamping classes along with demos and make ‘n takes throughout the month.

Stamp Fever participates in the Southern California Shop Hop! Our design team goes all out to deck our store in theme related finery and we always have a charming Photo Op to add to the memories of your Shop Hop experience.

Stamp Fever is hosting a Lawn Fawn 3rd Birthday celebration! The party is on Saturday March 16 from 1-4. If you are in the area, please stop in for a visit and to share some birthday cake with Kelly and Mike, owners of Lawn Fawn. Kelly will share a special Make ‘n Take featuring one of Lawn Fawn’s newest sets “Summertime Charm”. 

There will be prize drawings at the party but we don’t want to exclude our blog readers. We will randomly choose one winner from those who comment at The Stamp Fever blog and one more random winner from comments on the Hop Participant blogs. To increase your chances of winning: Follow the Stamp Fever blog in a reader or by email subscription; sign up for our Newsletter; follow Stamp Fever on Facebook and leave us a comment there. Each winner will receive a Lawn Fawn Stamp set and coordinating Lawn Cuts Die set.

Comment to enter prize drawing until 10:00 pm PDT on Friday March 15. The random drawing will take place at the party. The two winners will be announced Sunday, March 17 on the Stamp Fever Blog.

Please feel free to HOP on over to the blogs of all the participating ladies listed below!  They have made some gorgeous cards!   I also want to add a special THANK YOU to Nancy Kreuger for the invitation to be part of this exciting celebration and setting up this hop!

  
Nicole- Unify Handmade 
Chari- MossyMade 
Britta- Britta Swiderski Creative 
Vera- Ling's Design Studio 
Lynnette- Netter's Notables 
Barb- ...Enjoying Life 
Lin- Sending Hugs 
Marcy- En Papillote Arts 
Kathy- Wading in Creativity 
Katie- Katie's Quarks 
Virginia- Yes, Virginia 
Melissa- Love My Scraps 
Deborah- Society of Stampaholics 
Nancy- Happy Heart Studio
Lawn Fawn Blog 
Stamp Fever Blog 
Annette- My Clever Creations
  
Here is my card for the blog hop.  It's Critters on the Savanna and in my opinion, the cutest set ever!  Thanks for stopping by!

Crafting with Barb

When I saw this photo on Pinterest, I swooned! I used to decorate cakes and I know how much work this must have taken.  But as a card maker, I saw inspiration in color and design!  That's when I sent it over to my dear friend, Barb Engler, a most talented card maker in her own right! And I knew she was on vacation this week, so we hatched a plan to create together!

We decided to spend the afternoon on speaker phone (will learn to Skype VERY soon!) and craft together, using this beautiful photo as our inspiration.  We live half way across the country from each other, but it was like being in the same room.  We both bounced ideas off each other - even though our styles are so different.  I usually go more literal with an interpretation and she is more visual.  This time, for some reason, it was in reverse.

We are hoping to do this again very soon, because it is such a great way to get those creative juices flowing!

Pinterest

Here is my interpretation, but you should see Barb's!  Head on over to her blog, Enjoying Life, to see her AMAZING card!

 

I had a new Hero Arts stamp, Flowers and Stripes K5765, that was begging to be used.  I inked it up with the inspiration colors using distress stains Broken China, Shaded Lilac, and Squeezed Lemonade.  I then sprayed it with water.  I wanted a watercolor effect.  When dried, I stamped the Spring Memories stamp over it using Hero Arts mid-tone shadow ink Cornflower.

Finding colored paper that matched the photo was not as easy as I thought, but I found a piece of Core'dinations in the celery green for the image card blank. But I had to ink up a piece of Hero Arts snow layering paper in Tumbled Glass (thanks for the idea, Barb!) for the background piece.  It seemed to fit the bill!  I found the perfect embossing folder to emulate the circles in the photo and mounted my image on top of it with pop dots.

Next I created the flower using another piece of Core'dinations and a My Favorite Things flower die called Prima Dona Petals.  I set it off to the side and in the center of the image as in the inspiration photo.  I finished it all off by mounting it on white cardstock.  All in all, I'm pleased with how it turned out.  Most importantly, I loved spending the day with Barb getting inky!

What we would like to do is invite everyone to join in the fun using our photo inspiration to create a card and then post it to the Flickr Hero Arts Group forum.  Barb has posted a thread where you can add your photos too, as well as posting in the Flickr photostream.  That way we can see all the creations in one post.  No need to tag your photo with anything other than your stamps.  We do ask that you use a Hero Arts stamp for your main image, and not just a sentiment or embellishment. And for extra fun, we are both having a little giveaway.  Create a card by March 15th, 11:00 PM CST, 11:59 PM EST and we will each draw a name randomly! 

We are REALLY looking forward to seeing what you create!  Have fun and Happy Spring!

As always, I enjoy reading your comments!  Thanks!

Longing for Spring

Hi everyone!  A post has been LONG overdue, but I'm back in the saddle and with a new card and a cool challenge!

Just in time before I completely lose my mind from lack of sun up here in New England, Hero Arts has a new challenge for us!  It's full of fun and color and some great techniques.

I decided to use the color palette Hero Arts chose because it sang Spring to me and I am honestly burnt out on Christmas and Valentine's Day colors.  I also had a new Spellbinders die I wanted to try out and it was perfect for the design I had in mind. 

I used the Hero Arts stamp Scallop Flower because of its whimsical and organic nature, to go along with the Botanical Swirls die.  I couldn't resist dotting the flower centers with Ranger white Enamel Accents and then I fussy cut them out. I used Hero Arts Shadow Inks in Butter Bar, Soft Sky, and Soft Granite for the Made with Love sentiment.

I had some gorgeous sheer ribbon that was a gift from my friend Cheiron - it's perfect with all these soft colors and I used some gray and white twine to "tie" it all together!  I thought it needed a little feminine touch, so I used the Martha Stewart doily lace edge punch on the side.

I hope you get a chance to enter this fun challenge!  Happy Spring!

I'd love to hear your comments, as always!

Hugs,

Marcy