Vintage Christmas in July

Our newest challenge at Shopping Our Stash is called Christmas in July - and since it's our 400th challenge most of our team mates are offering a blog candy. So make sure you comment to win.

For my card I used a stamp from Stampendous called Snowy Postcard

It's very easy to make lovely cards with this stamp. I just sponged the stamped image with brown distress inks  and then added frantage shabby white embossing powder around the edges. For decoration I just layered several snowflake die cuts and added a vintage brad.

For my blog candy I'm offering this new Darice embossing folder for anyone who will comment on this post. Just tell me where are you from and if you celebrate Christmas.

Challenges:
Winter Wonderland - Christmas / Winter Buildings

Get Creative Challenges - Monochromatic

International Art & Soul - Christmas in July

Crafty Calendar - Christmas in July

Seahorse on watercolored background

Some time ago I was playing with paints and created a whole bunch of watercolor backgrounds, some of them mixed with shimmery stuff like PearlEx. Now I started using them :)

I embossed the seahorse with black EP to make it stand out more.

Challenges:
Country View Challenge - blues and greens
Challenge Up Your Life - Vitamin Sea
Take It Make It - Anything Goes

Poinsettia Christmas Cards

A while ago I watched Jennifer McGuire's video about using a large stamp to stamp multiple cards at the same time. She calls is 2-for-1 edge stamping trick. I decided to give it a try and use my large Create a Poinsettia stamp from Stampendous.

Images were colored with alcohol markers and the background sponged. Season's Greeting sentiment is also from Stampendous. Kept it pretty simple otherwise.

Challenges:

Merry Little Christmas  Blog  - Anything Christmas Goes

Cute N' Crafty Christmas - Anything Christmas Goes

Crafting By Design - Get Ready for Christmas

Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas Challenge - Anything Christmas

CAS Graduation Cards

I got this graduation themed die and since I'll need some graduation cards I decided to play with some watercolor and paint backgrounds.

 first background is done with pearly acrylic paints and has this lovely shimmer that does not show in the picture.

The other 2 backgrounds are watercolored.

Challenges:

Cardz 4 Galz - Graduation

CCEE Stampers - use at least 1 die

Always Fun Challenges - Graduation

Addicted to CAS - Graduation

Easter Animals

 Happy Easter Weekend to all who celebrate it. 

It's time to show you some Easter cards I made. Since I'll be working the whole weekend, I'm planning to give them to my co-workers.

I have a LOT of stamps that are being neglected, so I decided that if I take out a stamp set or a paper pack I'll make several cards using it.

Here is the first example:

Stamp set is from CTMH and is  called Easter Animals. Patterned paper and matching cardstock are also from CTMH. Embossing folders and ribbons are SU. Animals in the 3 cards on the top were colored with alcohol markers and the bottom one with Prismacolor pencils.

Challenges:

Crafty Cardmakers -Easter

Always Fun Challenges - Easter

Papercraft Challenges - Easter

Crafty Gals Corner - Easter

30 day Use Your Scraps challenge - Day 30 - All that's left

It's the last day of my 30 day scrap challenge and I will post the rest of cards I made during these 30 days and didn't post. 

Can't say I used up all my scraps, but I got into a habit of using them and going into my sorted scrap box first.

First we have 3 simple Easter cards made with images colored long ago and left with the scraps.

 Everybody Art Challenge - Animals

Papercraft Challenges - All The Critters

Birthday card using rose from Flourishes, colored with Prismacolor Pencils and SU sentiment 

Crafty Cardmakers - Flowers 

LOTV boy birthday card

another Penny Black card using the same image as couple days ago

 Everybody Art Challenge - Animals

Crazy 4 Challenges - Animals

watercolored image from a very old SU set

Use Your Stuff - Do You Believe in Magic 

My Time To Craft - Pink & Girly

this is the second take on Floating Frame technique

some images still got messed up by Press 'n' Seal so I stamped them again and covered the ooopsies

no stamping on this one - background is a piece of SU patterned paper colored with Prismacolors

30 day Use Your Scraps challenge - Day 29 - February Roses

Day 29

Current challenge at Shopping Our Stash is called Fabulous February so you could be inspired by symbols for February, like stone: Amethyst or flower: Violet or Primrose.\

I went with the purple for Amethyst and created this:

Image was colored with Prismacolor pencils and the embossing folder is by Tim Holtz.

Challenges:

Just Us Girls - Amethyst

Crafty Cardmakers - Flowers

Inkspirational - Use Your Stash

30 day Use Your Scraps challenge - Day 28 - Camera Kitty

Day 28

Today I have this cute card with Penny Black cat - image is colored with alcohol markers (as usual)

I used one of MFT old sketches for layout.  I layered 2 of the same die cut sentiments on top of each other to give the sentiment more dimension.

Challenges:

2 Crafty Critter Crazies - anything with a critter

613 Avenue Create - Anything Goes with option of Critter

Dragonfly Journey - one word

Penny Black Saturday Challenge - Anything Goes with option of flowers

30 day Use Your Scraps challenge - Day 27 - Painted Season Floating Frame

Day 27 of my scrappy challenge bring s a new experiment. I tried Jennifer McGuire's floating frame technique and here is the third attempt :)

I used my new Painted Seasons stamp set and dies. colors are Blueberry Bushel, Tempting Turquoise, Lemon Lime Twist and Granny Apple Green. Sentiments are also from SU

First attempt ended with Press N Seal - ripping the top layer of die cuts of, so then I didn't press so hard and was careful when removing it. It's a bit fiddly technique, but the results are pretty cool.

For the stamped images I recycled lot of white cardstock that had something else stamped on the other side - you know when you are trying to stamp the perfect image and you smudge it and put it aside for future use. Just make sure it's a good quality CS for this technique - it does seem to make a difference for Press N Seal

Challenges:

The Flower Challenge - Use your latest stamps/dies

Inkspirational - Use Your Stash

Seize the Birthday - Anything Goes

30 day Use Your Scraps challenge - Day 26 - Fluffy Passenger

Day 26

Today I made a card using Penny Black stamp called Fluffy Passenger

I quickly colored the image with alcohol markers and added a bit of Spica glitter pen on the bicycle. The stripy panel in the middle was created with  several different washi tapes. Then I added a spray of various flowers in the corner.

Challenges:

Modsquad - Clear or Rubber stamp (Penny Black)

Penny Black and more - Anything PB (option of tags)

Southern Girls - Girl Power