Crafty Sentiments - Anything Goes Challenge

Who's up for an anything goes challenge?!?!  I hope you are, because that's what Crafty Sentiments' Team B has for you this week!  A fun way to celebrate the last days of July and begin to think about August!  I used Pat with Flowers for my card.

This one is inspired by my sassy, stylin', 20-something niece, Kathleen, who is currently sporting a bright pink streak in her light brown hair!  I thought it added some whimsy to the card. With some extra time to putter around, I decided to follow the sequin trend in girl's clothing by adding some mini-heart sequins I've been hoarding since last summer to the bottom portion of my image.  They were a pain to use, so it's back on my shelf awaiting a future shaker card!

Challenges Entered:
CAS-ual Fridays #134 - Tic-Tac-Toe (sequins, white, dots)  -last challenge until 2015
The Pink Elephant #261/- AG
Through the Craft Room Door /- AG
Crafting from the Heart #29/ - AG
Digitally Sweet #98/ - Embellish it up
Less Is More #182 /- AG
Creative Fingers #44 - AG (2 wks)
Chocolate, Coffee & Cards #70/ - Polka Dots
Pile It On #30/ - Embossing
613 Avenue Create #82/ - AG/use a sentiment
Digi Chooseday #30/ - Layer it Up!

Sketch Saturday - Sketch #320

Another new sketch for you at Sketch Saturday.  This one was designed by Vannessa.  UK based company, Sir Stampalot is sponsoring us this week, so play along for a chance to win their fabulous prize.

My card uses a free digi, Sunflower Sprite, available from the current "Sprite Delight" challenge on the Aurora Wings blog.  By the time I was done coloring, the tones evoked a more fall than summer feel.   They reminded me of going to the farmer's market in September and seeing the deep colors of yellow and orange sunflowers.  They make a stunning, happy bouquet!

Choosing the papers was my biggest challenge for this card.  I think I made it harder for myself because of the color Copics I used for shading around the sprite. Wanting to use something other than BG000, I turned to B60 & 63.  Honestly, I wasn't all that thrilled with it, but it's good to experiment!

 I used PTI's Lemon Tart for the main yellow and stamped the leafy background with SU's Daffodil Delight ink.  (Lemon Tart ink was too light.)  Lil' Inker Designs Stitched Rectangle die gave some detail to the yellow bg and the sparkle is compliments of Stickles!

Copics Used:
Yellow sunflower -
Y15, 19 &24 with a bit of YR68

"Spotlight" card/ Little Miss Muffet

Orange Sunflower - YR04, 65, 68, E99
Orange Center - E41, 44, YG00; outer ring E41, 44, 47
Leaves - YG00, 03, 11, 23, 67
Sprite's Bloomers - E41, 44, 47
Skin - E00, 21, 11, R20
Colorless blender pen for the tips of the leaves & on her face.

Challenges Entered:
Aurora Wings #5 - Sprite Delight (until 8/16)
Through the Craft Room Door /- AG
Crafting from the Heart #28/- AG
Fan-Tastic Tuesday #45/ - AG
Crafty Girls Challenge #23/ - AG
Scribble and Scrap #23/ - AG
That Craft Place/ - AG
Little Miss Muffet #90/ - AG

Sister Act - Challenge #67

This week's Sister Act challenge is sponsored by A Day for Daisies.  Coloring this image put me in seventh heaven!  She's called A Special Flower.

I had so much fun creating this card.  Once the coloring was done, I decided to use my Lil' Inkers Stitched Oval Mat dies to frame the sweet girl.  I loved how it looked, but the downside was framing her cut out the flowers - and then the experimentation and problem solving began, including feeding my current obsession with the inlaid technique.  All of the ovals are inlaid, and the flower and grass are glued on top. The PTI sentiment is heat embossed and popped out.




I used E50, 51, 53, 35 for her hair.

Her skin is E000, 00, 21, R11.





Coloring in general and when using Copics takes a lot of practice.  My journey has involved a willingness to "let-go" and allow myself to experiment as I improve my skills.  So I thought I'd use this post to show you some of my process.


I generally start by printing multiple images of different sizes on my paper.  This gives me permission and freedom to experiment.  (I had to let go of feeling like I was wasting paper!)  Two images I narrowed down as my "finalists" are in the cut out section of the paper.

After deciding which sized image I want to use for my card, I began playing.  As much as I feel confident with hair, it is still something I work at for contrast and highlights.  I started with the largest girl in the upper left.  This allows me to decide what's working and what's not for my card's image.

I decided to make a pink dress, but in the end, this one with R11 was too much like her skin color, so I nixed it.









 
Knowing I wanted to keep her dress light, I thought about a white dress and giving the bottom some folds and a more defined waist.  These three pictures show me playing with the idea of folds.  Using Cs made the dress more gray than I wanted, so I tried R000. . . loved the soft pink!

This girl didn't make the "cut", but gave me another chance to work on hair, the idea of a white dress using Cs for shading, the flowers, grass and shading around her with BGs.

I used G000, 20 & 24 for the grass and BG0000, 000 and 11 for the bg shading around her.  I wasn't thrilled with the color placement of the flowers on this one, so I went back up to the pink dress girl and tried a more deliberate visual triangle of colors.

The girl on the right in my last picture is where I practiced coloring the dress.  She also happened to be the one I experimented with the die cutting and fitting those pieces into the puzzle for the final layout.  She's on my desktop waiting to be used in a future card.

I know this was a long post, and if you hung in with me until the end, I hope one person is inspired to keep trying and be patient with yourself as you work through the process.
Whether it's coloring with Copics, another medium, or trying a particular style of card making (such as CAS), learning takes persistence, practice, and just the right amount of skill-stretch. Thinking like an artist means tackling one thing at a time and not comparing your work to others.  Since art is personal, our challenges are likely not the same.  I hope you enjoy your journey as much as I'm enjoying mine!

Challenges Entered:
Pink Elephant #260 - Summertime
Through the Craft Room Door - AG
Crafting from the Heart #28/ - AG
Party Time Tuesday July Challenge - AG
Fan-Tastic Tuesday #45 - AG
Inky Chicks #34 - Birthday
Creative Inspirations #275 - Here Comes Summer
Crafty Girls Challenge #23 - AG
Scribble and Scrap #23 /- AG
That Craft Place - AG
Little Miss Muffet #90/ - AG

Sketch Saturday - Sketch #319

So excited to have A Day for Daisies as our Sketch Saturday sponsor.  I love the chance to color Tammy's images.  Each time I do, I am reminded of my progress with my Copics.  I'm not a trained artist and am largely self-taught using the internet and some online classes. I remember a time when ADFD images felt intimidating, but not so much any more.  There are still some that are too much of a stretch, but each time I choose an image, I pick one that will challenge me in one way.  It helps me grow and practice.

I was in heaven coloring this week!  Who wouldn't love this little sweetie called, Wild Daisy Nymph?  I tried to keep her hair tones light and her skin fair and am pleased with the outcome.  The trickiest part for me was her eyes.  I like how they reflect the light, but they seem a little bug-eyed!  I fussy cut the wings, turned them upside down and reattached them to the nymph.  Her wings are Stickled and my Copics were used to give the die cut flower some dimension.

I hope you will play along with us at
Sketch Saturday this week!

Challenges Entered:
Through the Craft Room Door /- AG (July 15-21)
Crafting from the Heart #27/ - AG
Aurora Wings #4/ - July Color bingo: blue, yellow, black
Shopping Our Stash #160/ - Can't Put it Down/Away (Copics)
Fan-Tastic Tuesday #44 - AG
Crafting By Designs/ - Use a Sentiment
Creative Moments #47/ - Use One Flower
Crafty Girls Challenge #22/ - AG

Sister Act - Challenge #66

It's Friday again and time for a brand new anything goes challenge at Sister Act.  Meljens is this week's sponsor.  Images were provided for the DT and I chose Detective Doggy.  I decided to make him bright and colorful to use for a card to send to my sweet granddaughter who lives in Colorado.

It's a pretty clean and simple card.  I had the embossed card back sitting on my desk, discarded from a different card.  I fussy cut the dog, created a speech bubble using words from a retired MFT set called Just My Type, added glossy accents to the magnifying glass, a strip of orange paper to ground the dog, and used three of my newly acquired enamel dots.  (I finally broke down and bought two packs!)

Challenges Entered:
Through the Craft Room Door/ - AG (July15-221)
Crafting from the Heart #27/ - AG
Clear It Out/ - KISS
Fan Tastic Tuesday #44 - AG
Crafting By Designs/ - Use a Sentiment
Little Miss Muffet #90/ - AG

Crafty Sentiments - Christmas in July Challenge + DT Announcement

This Crafty Sentiments challenge is for all of you folks who like to get a head start on your Christmas cards.  I admire you, but I can barely get my act together on December 1st, let along in July!
I'm on vacation right now, so I'm crafting in the morning rather than my usual night routine.  My hands were so shakey as I was cutting out this CSDimage, Cold Christmas, I decided I really need to cut back my coffee consumption!  Yikes!  Once I drank a liter of water, I was better!  I decided to use the sketch from the Friday Sketch Challenge for my card.  The partial circles are cut from glitter paper, there's some WInk of Stella on the tree branched, in the snow, and on the white part of her clothing.  The sentiment is from PTI; the tree is IO, and the stitched flag is from Lil' Inkers.

Crafty Sentiments is offering a freebie for you to use to join the challenge, but you need to request it by the 19th.  Stop by the challenge blog for more details and see what the DT is up to!  This week's winner chooses 3 digis from the Crafty Sentiments shop! 

Sketch #73

Challenges Entered:
Friday Sketch Challenge #73
Inky Chicks #33 - Christmas in July
Simply Create Too #65 - Christmas in July
4 Crafty Chicks #202 - Inspired By A Song (Let it Snow)
Crafting from the Heart #27- AG
Scribble and Scrap #22 - AG






On another note, I can finally announce I have been invited to be on the Southern Girls Challenge Design Team.  The challenge started in New Zealand, and the current DT is made up of crafters - across the globe.  There are two DTs, with new challenges posted two Thursdays a month, so that means one monthly card for me.  It has been fun becoming acquainted with the other gals and learning some slang from "down under".  Oy, Mate!!  I hope you'll stop by the Southern Girls Challenge blog and play along.

Sketch Saturday - Sketch #318

Deb designed the fun sketch for this week.  There are so many possibilities for it!  I decided to just die cut and not color.  As I planned the card in my head, I thought it would be a little simpler than it turned out.  I finally got the white panel right after three tries:  the first time, I was so focused on inset die cutting the word "happy", I didn't think about the flags; the second try, I made the white panel too small and forgot to stamp "birthday" before I embossed; the third time, all of that went smoothly, but after glueing it to the blue, there was too much white below the sentiment.  I was not starting again; hence the little strip of red paper to break up the white!

As I was going through my button stash while making this card today, I wondered if card-making is just a legitimate way to be a hoarder?!?!  I have JARS of buttons from when they were the trend and still carefully consider whether I should use particular buttons in case I need them in the future!  Like I am going to miss a button from the collection of my jars!!






Enough of that!  Stop by Sketch Saturday and see what the DT has created.  Simon Says Stamp! is this week's generous sponsor of a $25 gift certificate to their store.

Challenges Entered:
Color Q #249
Crafting By Designs/ - Use Dies
Creative Inspiration #273 - favorite occasion
Creative Moments #46/ - AG/Celebrations
Scribble and Scrap/ - AG
The Cutting Edge Challenge/ #3

Sister Act Challenge #65

Another Friday and a new anything goes challenge over at Sister Act, with Paper Nest as the sponsor this week.  I'm not using a sponsor image this week.  I have had a stack of stamps on my desk that have never been inked, so I thought I would tackle some of them.  It's helping me feel less guilty about the sets I ordered from all of the 4th of July sales!!

This feels like a CAS card to me - maybe it's all of the white space because I'm not sure if Susan Rahala and all of the other CAS gals I admire would call this one CAS.  I love how the EB folder reflects the idea of a maze!  Good thing I have a variety of folders!!   The stamp set is from Lil' Inkers and so is the stitched die.  

Challenges Entered:
Scribble and Scrap#22/ - AG
Crafty Girls/ #22- AG
Craftin' From the Heart/ - AG
Fan-Tastic Tuesday/ - AG
Through the Craftroom Door/ - AG

Sketch Saturday - Sketch #317

Ladybug Crafts Ink is this week's Sketch Saturday sponsor.  This company is new to me and has a variety of darling digis, so I have a feeling I will be spending some time and money at their site!

I manipulated Nikki's sketch a little to go with my image using an oval rather than a circle and changing the spot of my sentiment.  Sequins topped with Copic colored rhinestones were used to create the five little things under the focal image.

Stop by the Sketch Saturday Blog to be inspired!





Challenges Entered:
Crafty Girls Challenge #21 - AG
Southern Girls Challenge - Something round
Creative Fingers #42 - AG

Sister Act #64

Fitztown is sponsoring Sister Act's anything goes challenge this week.  They have an amazing variety of images in the digi section.

 My card is a super-simple CAS card.  I am always in need of Thank You cards, so I created a batch of these to have on hand.  I stamped the image and the sentiment, shaded a bit with my Copics, then put the whole thing in an embossing folder, ran it through my Cuttlebug and added some clear 4mm sequins from Pretty Pink Posh.  Bam!  Done!

Challenges Entered:
CASology 102/ - float
Tuesday Throwdown #202/ - AG
PPA #210 /- color challenge
CAS(e) This Sketch #83/

Crafty Sentiments Team B - No Patterned Paper Challenge

NO patterned paper?!?!  I thought not being able to use it was going to make me crazy, but to the contrary, I had a blast creating this card!

Two of the elements in this card might be familiar if you are a regular visitor to my blog.  I knew right away I would use a cut out, so I pulled out my Verve stars die again (so cute!).  Did you notice the same little Crafty Sentiments guy I used last time, called Day Dreaming?  He's a little blonder today.  One of the star die cuts is glued on his shirt, with white embossing powder is used for the word, "star".  I went through my stash of stamps and pieced together words for the sentiment, doodling around each of the boxes.  The window uses a Lil' Inkers stitched die and I created the ledge myself with kraft paper and my Copics!  Using a craft knife to cut around his elbows made it so he could lean on the ledge and built in dimension.  I can't believe how 3D it looks (more in the picture that IRL).  I added some clear sequins for some shimmer and used an embossing folder on the paper below the window.

Challenges Entered:
Pink Elephant/ - AG
Through the Craft Room Door/ - AG
Tuesday Throwdown/ - AG
Fan-Tastic Tuesday/ - AG
Avenue 613 Create /- AG
That Craft Place/ - AG
Crafting From the Heart #25/ - AG
Splitcoast Stampers Color Challenge #485/ - navy, yellow, sahara sand
Dream Valley Challenge #85/ - Inspired by a movie or a song (Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star)
My Sheri Crafts #136 /- A Star is Born