A Bright and Cheery Thanks

I decided I was not really happy with my entry for the Thank You challenge over at The Paper Players so I decided to create a new card. I was trying to use a sketch and the sketch just wasn't working for me very well. I am much happier with this card!

My card base is Whisper White and then I added a layer of Marina Mist. My DSP is from last years Occasion Mini and it is called Sunshine & Sprinkles. I am a bit of a paper hoarder and never use it because it is so pretty. And then I run into the problem that colors have been retired and it makes using my paper that much harder... so I am really going to be trying to use my DSP and not just let it sit on a shelf and look pretty.

Back to my card... I tied a knot in some Daffodil Delight ribbon and added it to one side of my card. It is really esy to add it- I just folded it over my card front and added a strip of adhesive to the back to tack it down. I used a thank you stamp from my collection. I want to say it is from the set So Very Thankful but I can't be sure. I converted most of my woodmount stamp sets to the clear and grouped like sets together. I have all my thank you sets in one case and I can't always remember what set each one came from. I figured I am never getting rid of thank you stamps so in a case they all went. I would rather store like sets together to have them handy at a glance and it really saves a lot of space! On one card I used Marina Mist and the other I used Melon Mambo to stamp my thanks.

I used the new and very awesome Banner Framelits to punch out my sentiment. I then used the next size bigger banner to punch out my background for my sentiment. I punched out my butterfly to match my sentiment color and then popped it up with a Stampin' Dimensional. I did pop up the entire card front, so the Marina Mist layer, on dimensionals also.

Is There Such a Thing As a Simple Thank You?

I don't know that there is such a thing as a simple thank you. Even if the card has a clean and simple design the feelings of appreciation mean so much. I designed this card with two challenges in mind. The first was a sketch challenge by Freshly Made Sketches that you can see here and then a thank you theme challange by The Paper Players that you can see here.

I kept trying to use a rectangular piece of DSP in the center and it just wasn't working for my card. I ended up pulling out my Labels Collection Framelits and cropping my Sycamore Street DSP that I got during last year's Sale-A-Bration. I used Pool Party as my card base. I colored one of the flowers from Posy Punch using my Summer Starfruit Stampin' Write Marker and then the petals with my Rich Razzleberry one. I punched it out using the Fancy Flower Punch. I did pop it up on dimensionals. My thank you sentiment comes from the set Wishes Your Way.

Sending Good Thoughts Your Way

Well, I took the plunge and finally did it! Did what you ask? I have always sorted my paper by color family and have seen many blogs where they shared that they sort it by color. I just didn't know if I could undo the way I sort after so many years. So, after putting some thought into it I figured it has to be much easier to put back away if it is just done my color so I switched it all up. So far, so good...

Now, onto my card. LeAnne, over at The Paper Players is celebrating her daughter's birthday this week and turned that into a challenge... to create a card with stars. You can see her post here. I really wasn't sure what I wanted to. Stampin' Up! retired their star stamp set, Seeing Stars, a few years ago and I have not purchased the new one they came out with last summer. I got my retired (or at least I think it is retired but any star punch would do) star punch out and still didn't know what to do. I decided to start with colors and choose Night of Navy and Daffodil Delight. Okay, now what? I still had Perfect Pennants on my desk that I used for the card I am going to share with you on Friday so I grabbed the 'sending good thoughts your way" sentiment since this card wasn't for a particualr occasion and I just decided I wanted a card I could send out just because. The sentiment seemed to fit. Then I got to looking at the striped pennant stamp and it all kind of came together from there. I stamped the sentiment in Night of Navy of to one side and then the striped pennant on the other side in Daffodil Delight. Then I added a punched out star out of Night of Navy. Even though I was trying to keep it clean and simple I still felt like it needed something. I decided to use one of the small stars from Seeing Stars, but you could easily use a star from the current set, and stamped it in Daffodil Delight. The thought of fussy cutting that star out almost made me pass out so I thought hey, just punch it out with a circle punch!! SO, my 3/4 inch circle punch might have just saved my life. I popped it on with a Stampin' Dimensional and then I had a cute, simple, all occasion card.

Color Challenge: What is That Kitty Thinking?

Color Challenge: Mission Accomplished! I really had a tough time deciding what I wanted to do for the Paper Players Color Challenge (see below for original post). After some sleep and much thought I decided that I would use the new stamp set from the Stampin' Up! Summer Mini called Touch of Kindness. It really is super cute! Here is the card I came up with:

I had a tough time photographing it because it kept having all these weird shadows, but I think you can still view it well. Isnt't that kitty and those birds adorable?? For the card base I used Crumb Cake, the embossed strip on the left is Baja Breeze and I used the NEW Solid Stripes Embossing Folder. Don't you love it?? The stripes go up and down so I turned my paper to to the side a little to that the stripes would be diagonal. My photo corners (this SU! punch is now retired) are Basic Gray and Poppy Parade. I used all FOUR colors from the challenge. My sentiment is also from the SU! set Touch of Kindness.

For my coloring: I did the birds in Baja Breeze, bird bath in Crumb Cake, flower petals with Poppy Parade, leaf and grass in Old Olive, the car in Basic Gray, and his collar in Poppy Parade. I used my Watercolor Wonder Crayons for all the coloring except what I did in Poppy Parade. For that I used my ink pad and blender pen.

Thanks for taking the time to look at what I created. I was really quite pleased with how it turned out.

Until next time Happy Scrappin' and Happy Stampin'!
Shelly

Color Challenge... I have no idea what I am going to do!!

Well, it is a sleepness night as I wait for the dryer to finish up so I thought I would go ahead and share the new color challenge from Paper Players. Here it is:

I have to admit these are not colors I use a lot much less all together. Well, I use the Poppy Parade and the Crumb Cake but not so much the other two. As I look at these colors I am wondering what in the world I am going to come up with. Even though I am clueless now, this is why I like doing challenges... both color and sketch ones because it helps keep my ideas fresh and they take me out of my comfort zone so I try things like new color combos that I originally might not have. You never know when you are going to happen upon a new favorite. I still remember the day I fell in love with Crumb Cake. It was only last summer!! Maybe is it the pretty new name??

Okay, I am not going to stay up much later so I can have plenty of time to sleep on what I want to do.

Until next time... Happy Scrappin' and Happy Stampin'!
Shelly