Too much sympathy....

I have needed entirely too many sympathy cards lately. Last Wednesday, my very dear friend, Linda, called to say her husband, Bob, had died. I was shocked. Bob was one of the funniest people I have ever known.

The story of how we met Bob and Linda has always been one of my favorite stories to tell. None of us remembers exactly what year it was, but it was probably 15 years ago. Tim and I went to Seattle for a conference he was attending. As a side trip, we decided to spend the weekend on San Juan Island at a bed and breakfast. The B&B, Hillside House, had an aviary and all of the room names were bird-themed. I recall there being one that was the only suite on the third floor, and it was called Robin's Nest. I wanted to stay in that room, needless to say! Unfortunately, it was already booked, so we took a different room. When we arrived and mentioned to the owners that were from Atlanta, they said there was another couple staying there from Atlanta. And THEY were in the Robin's Nest.

So, the next morning at breakfast, the owners introduced us to the other Atlanta couple - and it was Bob and Linda. We hit it off immediately and have been friends ever since. Linda even loaned me her very nice rain jacket that day since they were leaving, and we were going on a whale watching excursion. She said we would just have to get together when were all back in Atlanta so I could return it to her. Shortly after we returned home, I heard that Hillside House was for sale. I just did a quick search and found that it's still there, but now the third floor suite is called the Eagle's Nest.

We are so very thankful that we had them over for dinner and to spend the night with us a couple of weeks before Christmas. We had such a good time together.

The card above is the one I made for Linda because she commented on this card that she loved the background paper. I have been planning ever since to make her next birthday card with it, and this Gina K. Designs stamp, but it seemed really well suited for a sympathy card, too.

And, as if that weren't enough sadness for one week, last night we received the call that we have been dreading for the last year or so. My mother-in-law passed away yesterday. She was a wonderful, caring person who welcomed me into the Kirkpatrick family with open arms almost 25 years ago. She had been in deteriorating health for a while, but when we spent Christmas with her, she seemed to have rallied and be doing better. Tim, his brother and sister, and all the spouses have been planning a visit to see her and take her out to dinner next month to celebrate her 80th birthday, which would have been March 16th.

Sorry to have a downer of a post today, but that, unfortunately, is life sometimes. Thanks for 'listening'. Hug your loved ones....

Shimmery Iris

I love the new line of Shady Tree Studios stamps from Cornish Heritage Farms. They are a lot of fun to color and there are so many options for using them. I colored this Iris Bloom with Copic markers to match the patterned paper and then went over the lighter areas of my coloring with some Shimmerz paint to give it a bit of sparkle. The image was stamped on Cryogen white paper, which also has a nice shimmer, and then it was cut with a long rectangle Nestabilities die and layered on a scalloped mat that was cut from Prism Majestic Purple card stock. The embossed patterned paper is from Cloud 9 Design.

The sentiment is from Papertrey Ink's Mixed Messages set. I die cut the tag and its mat using two Spellbinder's Double Ended tags, but cut them on one end with my scalloped edge scissors. The tag was adhered to my main image panel with a Stampin' Up lavender rhinestone brad. The sheer lavender ribbon is from Offray and was added to cover up a mistake I made....but I won't tell what it was ;-)

Thanks for looking. Have a good weekend!

SC215 - Best Fishes!

This card was made using last week's sketch from Splitcoast Stampers. The fish stamp is from Impression Obsession, and I colored it using a new product I recently bought, called Shimmerz paints and Blingz. They are water-based paints that are very shimmery and come in 35 colors. I started out purchasing four colors, so my palette was a bit limited, but I thought they would be perfect for working with my fish stamps. They are fun to work with, so I'm sure I'll be getting some more colors soon!

In addition to filling in the stamped image, I used it to paint the edges of my card and both of the Nestabilities Labels Two panels. I also used some blue Taylored Expressions' Tiny Twinkles for the fish's bubbles and added a few Dew Drops in the bottom left corner of the card to balance it out. The patterned paper is from my stash and the two shades of teal card stock are from Prism.

That's about it. Hope you're having a good week so far! Thanks for looking!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Saturday and Happy Valentine's Day! I am happy to be home after a week on the road for work. And when I arrived home last night, and walked into my office, which was dark, there was a distinct smell of roses....I turned on the lights and lo and behold, there was an arrangement of a dozen red roses, some babies breath, eucalyptus and assorted greenery. Leaning against the vase was an envelope that read Happy Valentine's Mommy. Tim said the cats had gotten the card, but he had to help them with the roses...;-) Anyway, it was a very nice surprise, but I won't be opening the card until this evening....and I still have to make Tim's card...eek...;-)

So, these two cards were made a while ago for Repeat Impressions, but I decided to hold off posting them until today. They are pretty straight forward and simple, but I love the color combination of the pink, white, burgundy and kraft. The first card was embossed with the Swiss Dots Cuttlebug folder to give it some texture, then I swiped some Versamark Dazzle ink across it to give it some sparkle (which doesn't show up in the photo, of course). I stamped the image using the Versafine Raspberry ink, and then embossed it with clear embossing powder. I cut it out using a Labels One Nestability die and then colored the edge with a gold leaf pen. This layer was adhered to a layer of Stampin' UP! Purely Pomegranate and then a layer of heart patterned paper.

For the second card, I also used a Kraft card base and adhered three strips of Heidi Swapp packing tape to make my 'patterned' paper. Can you tell that I made this card shortly after getting my labels dies - I used six layers of them!

The image was stamped with Versamark and embossed with gold embossing powder. The gold heart in the bottom corner was also covered with Versamark and gold embossed and set on top of a pink heart that had been edged with the Versafine Raspberry ink.

Like I said, not much to them, but here they are to wish you a Happy Valentine's Day since they are the only ones I've made (so far)! Enjoy your weekend! I'm off to make some cards!

Comfort and Peace

I found myself in need of a couple of sympathy cards last week, so I did something I don't do very often and made the two cards using the same materials, at the same time. I started out selecting the stamps I wanted to use - Gina K.'s Comfort and Peace set.

For both cards, I used Cosmo Cricket Gretel Butterflies patterned paper and butterflies that were cut using a Martha Stewart punch. I selected different embellishments for each card, as well as making them different sizes. The first card is 5 1/2" square, and the second card is a standard A2 (4 1/4" x 5 1/5") card.

On the first card, I stamped the images using three colors of Ranger Adirondack dye inks (Rust, Latte, Espresso) and cut the image and a mat for it using my Labels One Nestabilities. The sentiment and its mat were cut using my Long Rectangles Nestabilities. I added some crocheted lace from my stash and some velvet Cosmo Cricket ribbon to the bottom, with a couple of pewter leaf brads inserted through the two layers of ribbon.

For the second card, I made my base using Papertrey Ink Kraft card stock and added a layer of Eames Painting Canvas Brown Umber card stock, which has a nice texture to it. For this one I just stamped a single flower image with Adirondack Rust ink and airbrushed the background with a Copic marker while it was still in the die.

At the bottom of the card, I added a layer of plain twill with another layer of velvet flower ribbon on top. The sentiment was also stamped with the rust ink and airbrushed and was adhered, with its mat, on top of the two layers of ribbon.

I added a few dew drops in the upper right corner and called it done. Sympathy cards are never fun to make, but hopefully they provide some 'comfort and peace' to the recipient.

Hope you're having a good week! Mine's been busy so far.

Thanks for stopping by!

CPS100 - Thanks a bunch!

I made this card for for Card Positioning System's Anniversary Celebration contest. This was a hard sketch for me at first. I had pulled several sheets of Cosmo Cricket's Honey Pie line (leftovers from these card folders). I couldn't figure out how to combine the different sheets of patterned paper so they looked right together, so I decided to sleep on it (this really seems to help me when I hit a road block on a card). The next morning, I saw this post from Debbie Olson, and saw that she had pulled off a perfect combination of these papers. But I still couldn't make it work for me, and then I remembered this post that Lisa Lee did using a ghosted background for an inchie and decided to try that for my two smaller panels. It's a really fun technique and I like the way it all came together.

The stamp is KarenLockhart's Geraniums - her stamps are really fun to color and I love that when you browse her site and hover your mouse over the stamped image, you see it colored. All three images were colored with Copic markers and the geraniums all have some Stickles on them (Fruit Punch on the main image and Diamond on the ghost images). I cut the main image out using a Labels Nestability and did a little doodling with a Stampin' UP! Rose Red marker around the edge while it was still in the die. I colored the edge after I removed it from the die and adhered it to a piece of sparkly Stardreams Stationery and added Kaiser Mango Pearls to each corner. The sentiment, from Stampendous, was stamped in Ranger Adirondack Cranberry beneath the Geraniums image.

The card base and the panels for each of the stamped images is Taylored Expressions' Choice Buttercream, which is very nice for coloring with Copics. The ghost images were matted on BasicGrey Strawberry Smoothie. The red layer on top of the card base is also Stardreams Stationery that I scored at the top and bottom and paper pierced between the score line and the edge. The patterned paper is Ella from the Honey Pie collection. I airbrushed a couple of clear buttons with a pale yellow Copic, tied a bow in each button with some pink embroidery floss (recycling my old cross stitching supplies there...) and put them in opposite corners. The yellow grosgrain ribbon is from Stampin' UP!.

I think that about covers it - sorry for the novel! Hope you've had a good week! I'm looking forward to going to the Heirloom Productions' stamp show tomorrow with my Krafty Kat friends. Have a good weekend!

Card Details:
Patterned Paper: Cosmo Cricket Honey Pie - Ella; Basic Grey Strawberry Smoothie
Card stock: Taylored Expressions' Choice Buttercream; Stardreams Stationery
Stamps: Lockhart Stamp Company; Stampendous
Inks: Memento Tuxedo Black and London Fog; Adirondack Cranberry
Ribbon: Stampin' UP!
Pearls: Kaisercraft
Copic Markers: E00, E01, E08, E55, Y23, Y38, YG03, YG11, YG95, W1, W3, R000, R02, R11, R32, R35, R81, R85, G24, G94, G99, 0
Misc.: Buttons - 7 Gypsies; Ranger Stickles (Fruit Punch and Diamond); Nestabilities

Happy Anniversary

Before I left for CHA, I made this anniversary card for my mother and her husband, who had their anniversary last week.

I stamped the heart from Stampin' UP!'s Always set twice on Very Vanilla paper and embossed it with Powder Keg's (now known as PK Glitz) Buttered Rum embossing powder. I cut both hearts out (gee, that sounds ghoulish...) and mounted them on the green mat that was cut out with Spellbinder's Labels Two Nestabilities.

The sentiment was also stamped and embossed with the Powder Keg embossing powder. I loved this sentiment for them because my mother has been into various forms of sewing (embroidery, needlepoint, smocking...) for as long as I can remember. I, on the other hand, have ZERO sewing talent (well, OK, I did a little cross stitching for a while, but how hard is it to stitch an X??), so I used a gold gel pen to add some faux stitching around the mat and the sentiment. I added a trio of gold beads to the corners and added some ribbon and a bow around the mat.

Funny story about this card - I had it all finished up and one of our cats was crying outside my stamp room, so I let her in and she got up in my lap while I was trying to figure out if there was anything else the card needed. In one fell swoop, she leaned in, grabbed the tail of the bow and yanked it completely out....I almost started to cry, as I had worked on that bow for quite some time, trying to get it 'just right', but in the end I just had to laugh. And put her in her room for the night....I slept on it and finished it up the next morning. Unfortunately, the final bow wasn't as purty as the bow she destroyed, but it turned out OK. And that is why my cats are not usually allowed in my stamp room....

One more funny story I left out of my CHA post. I talked to my cousin before I left for the show and she said I should look up her daughter while I was out in California, but I told her I wouldn't have an opportunity since I was going to be with other people and would be in Anaheim and not L.A. I didn't even have an opportunity to meet up with my sister, who lives in L.A. and had a birthday while I was out there.... So, I'm sitting on the plane coming back to Atlanta and about an hour into the flight a voice from the seat diagonally behind me says my name and I turn around and there she is - my cousin's daughter (my first cousin, once removed, I guess...). How is that for a small world?? So, I did get to visit with her, after all! She's a big wig at the Cartoon Network (in charge of developing all of their movies) and was on her way to Atlanta for some meetings about her new movie. Very fun coincidence.

Hope you're having a good week, thanks for reading this little novel!

Card details:
Patterned paper: Stampin' UP! Haiku
Card stock: Stampin' UP! More Mustard and Very Vanilla; green card stock from my stash
Stamps: Stampin' UP! (heart); Papertrey Ink (sentiment)
Ink: Versamark
Ribbon: Ellen Hutson
Misc.: Embossing Powder - Powder Keg; gold beads: Michael's

I'm Baaaaaaack.....

Hello, it's me.....the bad blogger.....I'm back after my trip to the Craft and Hobby Association (CHA) trade show and a two-day bout with a nasty migraine. This was my first experience at CHA and it was quite overwhelming. There is so much to see and do at the show that it's impossible to see and do it all. I was so engrossed in it all that I didn't get many pictures, unfortunately.

The first day there, I had a class with Suze Weinberg, called Melt Art Workshop. I have owned all the equipment and supplies for the techniques we learned for over a year and had never taken them out of their packaging, so this class was a great introduction. Here is the finished product - a Grungeboard book that we painted with Ranger Metallic Paint Dabbers. To that, we added a Grungeboard flourish, some rub-ons and the three pieces of melt art that we created:

During the class, Suze noticed the butterfly necklace I was wearing and insisted on getting a mold of it, so here is a picture of Suze, me, my necklace and her mold of it!

One booth where I spent quite a bit of time gawking was the Ranger booth. They had great demos and make-and-takes, but there was always a line for the make-and-takes, so I didn't bother. I did get a front row space watching the incomparable Tim Holtz doing some demos of his new Grunge paper and other products, and I finally remembered to get out my camera and snap a few shots:

And last but not least, I had the opportunity to spend about 20 minutes talking to Debbie Olson, one of my absolute favorite bloggers. Here we are at the make and take at the Just Rite Stampers booth:

So, it was a great experience, in spite of the fact that I had a cold. Thank you to Laetitia and Tonya from Scrap Chic Boutique for letting me tag along with them to the show - you ladies are the best!

And, while I was at the show, my sister had a birthday. Here's the card I made for her:

This is Sassy Suzie from Stampin' UP! I've had this set for about a year and it had never seen any ink, so it was high time. And since she is my OLDER sister, it seemed like a good occasion to use this set!! I used Taylor's sketch from January 16th (TECC51) for the layout.

The image and the first part of the sentiment were stamped on Papertrey Ink Stamper's Select and colored with Copic markers. I colored the edge with a purple Copic marker to match Suzie's top. The second part of the sentiment was cut out with my double ended ribbon dies from Spellbinders and then airbrushed with a Copic marker while still in the die. The background paper is some fun scalloped-edged paper from American Crafts.

I added some Stickles for her necklace and earrings to give her a bit of bling! The three lavender strips are embossed leaf paper from The Paper Company. I added black brads on the ends of the strips and put it all together. Pretty simple, but fun. And a good dose of purple for someone who loves it.

Sorry I've been out of commission for so long, thanks for bearing with me! I will do better this week, I promise! Thanks for looking!