Do you moo?

I haven't done a Moo challenge for months. It's fun to be feeling "artsy" again. Here's my Moo for this week's challenge! I used my own photograph of a butterfly, photoshopped onto this cute little girl image from
Quietfire Design. "Life's Simple Pleasures" stamp is from Amuse, heat-embossed
with Ranger Seafoam White EP. Thanks for visiting today!

CPS Challenge # 79

This is my first try at a Card Positioning Systems challenge. I used My Minds Eye papers and frame, a
Quiet Fire Designs sentiment stamp, and an Inkadinkado floral stamp.

Thank you so much for visiting my blog today.

Wednesday Stamper Challenge

I'm tickled pink to see that Wednesday Stamper challenges are weekly again! This week's challenge is to use circles. I repeated circles in a stamp (Hero Arts decorative circle, embossed with Ranger Seafoam White embossing powder), cardstock (cut with Spellbinders Nestabilities), dry embossing (using the Swiss Dots Cuttlebug folder), eyelets, brads and dainty little pearls. I also cut the image (underneath the scalloped circles) in a circle.

Thanks for coming by today.

The circles slide open to see the image underneath, on which I stamped another circle, a postmark,
by Heather's Stamping Haven in Ottawa.

For a friend

This week's Created by Hand challenge is to use a tool or product you've never used before. I used my new Quietfire Design stamp, and also a pair of hinges from my husband's toolbox. This weeks challenge over at Arty Girlz is to reflect summer in our work. So I used my own sand dollar photo for this card, which will be for a friend moving to a new home. Underneath the hinged flap, I printed the following Irish Blessing:

"May love and laughter light your days,and warm your heart and home.May good and faithful friends be yours,wherever you may roam.May peace and plenty bless your world with joy that long endures. May all life's passing seasons bring the best to you and yours."

The Papertake Weekly challenge is to use stitching somewhere.

I added a hat pin with pearls and a Swarovski rondelle bead for a little added bling.

Thanks so much for taking the time to visit today!

Tuesday Challenges

This week's Created by Hand challenge is to use the word "Dream" in our art. This week's Crazy Amigo challenge is to use distress/vintage theme. I combined both challenges for this piece. I'm not very comfortable with the distress style, so this was a significant challenge for me. In fact, I was so disappointed with the first card I posted here that I deleted it and created this one when I really ought to have been sleeping (lol). It was sooo bad that I just didn't want to leave it on my blog! The sentiment and flourish stamps for this replacement card are from Quietfire Design. I stippled Tim Holtz distress inks over the base, on SU Very Vanilla cardstock, stamped the flourishes with Tim Holtz ink, the sentiment with Ancient Page Chocolate ink.

Impression Obsession designers challenged ourselves to do a monochromatic colour piece this week, and this week's Arty Girlz challenge is to use shapes.This is my offering. I hope the heart shapes will qualify. This Garden Heart stamp from IO (designed by Leigh Hannan) is one of my very favourites, and I use it often. I gold embossed it, and paired it with gold-embossed foil paper from Penny Black. I added a Cuttlebugged heart and a hat pin with pearls and Swarovski crystals in the centre. Several other IO designers will be posting their monochromatic colour challenges today too, hope you can stop by to see what they've done.

This is a birthday card for my beautiful, brilliant daughter, who's Mum to my four busy grand-boys and a full time master's degree student in a research program, and will be accompanied by this gift,
among assorted other delightful secret girlie goodies.

You can see Daniela's card here
You can see Julie's card here
You can see Laura's card here
You can see Penny's card here

THANKS so much for stopping by my blog today!

For my daughter...

...who never drops into my blog (lol). This is a necklace and earrings
I made for her birthday next week.

She and her family currently live in Quebec, but long to come home to Nova Scotia,
so I always include something Nova Scotian in gifts for her.

The focus of the necklace is a glass sand dollar piece made by a local arts student here in Nova Scotia (I can't remember her name, sorry!) I used Mother of Pearl beads, sterling silver beads and "gold dust" beads, which are actually rust coloured with the most beautiful gold flecks. My camera's just not good enough to capture the real colours I guess. She prefers "simple" earrings,hope she likes these.

Thanks for stopping by today.

Go with all your heart...

I just LOVE this sentiment stamp, from Quietfire Design, and use it often. It's done from
artist Suzanne Canon's beautiful original hand calligraphy.

The Paris collage stamp is from Hero Arts, stamped twice on background paper inked with Ecoline Watercolour Inks (also available from Quietfire) and outlined with Krylon gold leafing ink. Then I cut out the second Eiffel Tower and pop-dotted it for a little additional dimension. The keyhole is an old embellishment from my stash.

The Created by Hand challenge this week is to do "Journey Art," and the Wednesday Stamper
challenge is to incorporate keyholes, and because I thought they were such a good "fit,"
I created this card this morning for each of them.

I've been away from challenges all summer long, busy doing other things...
travelling, entertaining, gardening, so it's feeling GREAT to be playing again.

Thank you so much for visiting today.

OUT of my comfort zone again!

Well between visiting grandchildren and attention to gardening, I haven't done a single challenge all summer long! Today, it's raining, so it's a perfect time to start working on challenges again. This week's Arty Girls challenge is to create anything without using patterned paper. This project comes from a need to try something "different."

This is a dollar store wooden piece I've been playing with all morning. I was hoping to achieve a sort of "hammered metal" finish, and this is the result. To get here, I first painted the box with Gesso, then Lumiere gold paint. Then I tore up and crumpled up hundreds of little bits of tissue paper, and stuck them all over the box with Aleene's Original Tacky Glue. I also glued on pieces of lace to the top and bottom. After I heat-dried this layer, I finger-painted a layer of gel medium all over, and heat set that. Then I added several layers of silver, gold, and platinum embossing powders, heating to melt after each addition. When you heat after using the gel medium and PVA glue, you get some really neat "bubbling" effects added to your texture. Then I used several different colours of Lumiere paints, rubbing them all over the textured base with my fingers. I stamped and black-embossed the Quietfire Design sentiment stamp on a piece of Lumiere-painted chipboard, added Swarovski crystals around the edges, and rolled the edges in platinum UTEE, heat embossing again. Finally, I stamped these new Quietfire Design dragonflies in a couple of colours of Fantasy Film, and glued them to the box,
along with a couple of larger Swarovski crystals for their heads.

I'll submit this piece as my Quietfire Design Team project for this month as well.
It'll eventually end up in my son's apartment; he enjoys having some of my quirkier pieces around. ;)

Thanks for visting today!

Birthday card

This one's for a special friend's fiftieth birthday. Hand stitched with Sulky Metallic threads. Gold embossing done with Top Boss Gold embossing powder and Inkadinkado flourish Happy Birthday stamp.

Thanks for visiting!

Impression Obsession new release stamps!

It's been a while since I've posted. It's been even longer since I created any cards! Summertime gardening and grandparenting ave taken the front seat for me, so it's been delightful to play again in my happy room! I'm LOVING these newly released Impression Obsession stamps!

This card was done with the large Damask Snowflake, which can be found here on the IO website. This stamp is also available in a smaller version. I've used that one to create Christmas hanging ornaments. I'll post those another time. The border was done with Martha Stewart's Lace Doily edge punch.

This card's done with the Winter Wonderland Tree stamp, a Leigh Hannan design. After stamping ang gold embossing, I sewed some seed beads onto a few of the snowflakes. You can find this gorgeous stamp here.

This card was done with the Poinsettia and Holly stamp, found here. I stamped and embossed on cardstock, then stamped and embossed again, twice, on white vellum. I watercoloured the centres with Tombow markers, then cut and pop-dotted them in the centre. I used the Fiskars Holly border punch for the side.

This card was done using two stamps of different sizes, same design, called the Swirl Tree, using Clearsnap Chalk Inks. The large tree can be found here, and the smaller one here. I stamped the side trees with Clearsnap chalk ink, then gold embossed and pop-dotted the centre tree. I embellished the card with a little swirly
hand stitching and beading at the bottom.

Thanks so much for dropping by today.