Watercolor with distress inks

The challenge in our Stamping group was to watercolor an image using our distress ink pads.  I applied the ink to my craft mat, you can use your blocks you use for stamping too, then took my water brush and picked up the ink and started water coloring.  This is going to my sister in laws long time guy friend, we think of him as our brother in law they have been together so long.

Stampendous -- Cape Hatteras Light, NC stamp colored w/ distress inks
Distress inks -- Mustard seed, weathered wood, tumbled glass, bundled sage, frayed burlap, hickory smoke, rusty hinge forest moss
Spellbinders -- Labels eight die
Stamps of life -- minis 4 circles sentiment stamp set

Hope your enjoying a lovely Sunday, we have hit 70 degrees, but it is quite windy and the sun has left us as we are to get rain this afternoon into evening.

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by,

Connie
Dires  -seed, tumled gass, samps of life -- minis4 circles stamp set

Dies R Us Red Challenge

It is funny because I don't do many red cards and here I am with two in a row, last time I used punches this time I am using dies.  Over at Dies R Us they are doing a challenge using the color red and your dies, I have almost run out of time it ends in a couple days but I finally got it in, you can read about it HERE on their blog .  This is going out to another lady in our card making group.

The flowers I cut from red but wanted to add a little something with them so I cut some feathers out of mulberry paper, and tucked it all in my die cut border to ground them, along with adding a die cut tag also!

I did not have any red gems, so I colored my clear ones with red marker but they came out very light even though I used my darkest red.

Crate paper -- DIY shop paper
Spellbinders -- Asters & poppies, A2 curved borders one dies
Taylored Expressions -- Fine Feathers and Designer mini tags die and many mini occasions sentiment stamp
Mulberry paper
American crafts -- twine
Craftaroo -- rhinestones colored w/markers

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by today, I appreciate you letting me know you did,
Have a wonderful weekend,

Connie

Heart Flowers

I had seen a few cards around Valentines that used hearts as flowers and I thought that was so pretty and a cute idea, so this is my take on that, although this is not a valentine card this is a birthday card for one of the older ladies in my cardmaking group that I have known for over 10 years, she reminds me of my mom.  Her Birthday falls on the 29th of February so it is special when she can actually celebrate it on the day as she can this year :)

I stitched the hearts by hand to the paper, a few cards  I saw did double layers of hearts but I opted for just a single heart on each stem. This is a great way to use those scraps we have too.

Crate paper -- DIY Shop paper
Martha Stewart -- Heart, border and butterfly punches
Spellbinders -- Labels trio die
Gina Marie stamps -- Birthday words sentiment stamp
Recollections -- pearls
Offray -- Ribbon

Yesterday's snow storm came in quite hard but by mid day it started to warm up and the sun came out and all the snow melted, they had canceled school because we were to get 5-7 inches but by evening it was almost all gone so we were able to have bible study last night.  Because of the wet heavy snow and such high winds there were a lot of down wires and quite a few people were without power, the church even lost power but luckily we just had a bit of flickering of our lights but no loss power.  I hope all of you in the storms path fared well through the storm too.  I heard of the terrible tornado's and am praying for all those effected.

Thanks so much for stopping by again today,

Connie

Cozy Birthday

My nephew hunts and fishes, I have done so many deer cards for him that I was running out of ideas and then I came across this antler die my hubby had purchased for his art and I remembered he had bought the fire and logs dies at different times when they were on sale at our Local stamp store, and this little scene was born.  I have done this before trying to make the sentiment look like it is in a picture frame this time on a mantel, I colored the outside of the die with brown marker. I shaped the mantel so that it had a little ledge on it to support the frame.

I cut down a piece of brick embossing folder to make the fireplace, I inked a background piece of cardstock (sorry I forgot to write down the colors I used) and added the cut out shapes and layered the fire and logs on top then put it behind the embossed piece.

Tim Holtz -- brick embossing folder
Poppystamps -- Warm and cozy fire and fireplace logs dies
Memory Box -- Curved Antlers dies
My mind's eye -- Lost and found 2 papers
Spellbinders -- classic scalloped sq small die
Taylored Expressions -- Many mini occasions sentiment stamp

I am sharing today's post with Stephanie's Roses of Inspiration link up , always so much inspiration over there it is like visiting Pinterest :)  I have met so many sweet bloggers from her link up's, thank you Stephanie for hosting this each week!

I hope you are staying warm and cozy wherever you are, we had a very hard frost this morning and they are telling us snow is on the way tonight into tomorrow, the amounts keep changing as the days go by, hoping for a small amount.

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by today, and leaving a little comment to let me know you did,  Have a wonderful day,

Connie

Dahlia Flower

I went by a pattern in my Cardmaker - Beautiful Blooms magazine to make my card. If you have the magazine it is on pages 32-33. This magazine is full of all kinds of flowers to make. HERE is a link to it if you are curious about it.

I save a picture of all the cards I have made for people so that I don't send two of the same type card or image, I went back and looked and I had made this card before back in 2008 for my girlfriend, today's card went to my Secret sister for the reveal.

Here is a picture of the card I made back in 2008:  Hopefully I am better at my picture taking now :)

And here is the card I made now:

I decided to do them as buds opening, not a whole flower.  Hand stitched the stems with floss and added some punch leaves that I scored some veins with my stylus.  The background is a burlap embossing folder, so this card had a lot of texture to it.

I found THIS video on how to make the flower so you don't have to go out and buy a magazine.  I am not sure what size circle I used for my flowers but I don't think it was as small as this girl used, but I think she has great instructions.

Taylored Expressions -- Burlap embossing folder
Teresa Collins -- He said she said papers
Martha Stewart -- Leaf  and tag punches
Spellbinders -- classic circle lg. die
Offray ribbon
ODBD -- Mini tag sentiments stamp

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by today and I hope you have a blessed Sunday!

Connie

Don't stop dreaming

My niece turned 18 last month, she is in the midst of choosing a college to go to in the fall and just enjoying her Senior year of high school, I just thought this sentiment was appropriate for this time in her life, and the cat is just too cute :)

Whimsy stamps -- Cat stop thinking about you stamp set, colored w/markers
Teresa Collins -- He said she said paper
Spellbinders -- A2 matting basics A and classic rectangles dies
Martha Stewart -- Border punch
Fiskars-- Ribbon
Kaiser -- Rhinestones

We are enjoying a touch of spring this weekend before we get back into our normal mid 40's temperature next week, I always enjoy this little spurts of warm in the middle of winter.
I hope where you are that you are enjoying whatever weather you are having.

Thanks so much for taking the time out to stop by and to let me know you did, so good to hear from you, Have a most wonderful and creative weekend!

Connie

Stencils

Our February challenge in my stamping group had us use a stencil on a clean and simple card.  I usually like the pile more on kind of cards myself, LOL!  It is usually all I can do to slow down and stop adding things, so hopefully this is clean and simple enough.

A friend from church was given a whole box full of color samples her brother had from his job, they were throwing them away so he gave them to her thinking her daughters may be able to use them in crafting but she said they weren't really using them and she thought maybe I could use them on my cards. So I thought I would make her a thank you card for thinking of me using one of the color samples, and my stenciled background.

Tim Holtz -- Dot Fade Stencil-- used Distress ink in Scattered straw
Martha Stewart -- border punch
Heidi Grace -- Winnefred St. Stamp set for the flowers
Stickles -- baby blue and yellow for flower centers
David Tutera -- Celebrate sentiments

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by today,

Connie

Crochet Doily and Coasters

This is the set that I gave my secret sister for Christmas, I know I am a bit behind on my postings.

There is a long story behind this and since it was a couple of months ago that I did all this it is hard to remember exactly how it all came about but I will try to share with you the patterns I used to make these.

It all started with Oliva's post HERE . I loved the colors and cute design and it was one I thought I could do so I followed links she had to other blogs and came up with This pattern here that I really liked .  So I decided to do that one for the coasters.  Then I found This Link , that I used for the big doily and thought it could go with the coasters, and that is how this came about.

I was able to get the whole set done with one skein of yarn so that was nice.  I am lucky that there are a lot of ladies in the church that crochet so it wasn't giving me away that I made these for her, in fact I don't crochet nearly as much as the other girls so she would probably think they are from them or that they made them and were bought buy them.  After the reveal she said she liked them and her colors for her living room is green, I am not sure she likes this shade but I thought it was pretty.

We were above freezing this morning when I woke up, that is exciting and yesterday the sun came out and it warmed up into the 40's so most of our snow we had Sunday has melted.

Hope you are having a good start to your week. Thanks so much for stopping by today, I really appreciate it!

Connie

Happy Valentine's Day

I went with the PoppyStamps Challenge HERE, for my hubby's Valentine card this year.  The challenge is Crazy in Love, and you were to use nontraditional colors or die in unexpected way and I tried to do both with my card.  First no red's on this card and the dies are tendrils and the flower center from the poinsettia die set. Made into the shape of a heart.

Poppystamps -- Lovely tendrils and Blooming Poinsettia dies
Sandylion -- Letter stickers
Corner stickers -- sorry no name
Stickles -- Vintage photo for flower centers

The card measures 5x6 1/2.

My hubby did a little recycling on the card he made for me, the hearts are cut from a red solo cup and the swirls were made from a post it note.  The others are dies.  His card measures 3 1/4 x 4 1/2.

It snowed again today, I would say we probably have a couple inches, not to bad once again, There was a lower attendance than normal at church today, right at the time everyone should be coming in it looked like a blizzard out there, I have to go early so I made it in when it was just starting.  Enjoyed a nice lunch out with friends ( I wanted to try the Velvet cake blizzard at Dairy Queen) before heading back home.
   Hope you all had a nice weekend and have a wonderful week ahead of you.  Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by, so good to hear from you,

Connie

Pleasant thoughts

When I saw this image it reminded me of my great nephew, when he was younger he was always climbing, even on his parents :)  Now he is in middle school, so I don't know how much climbing he likes to do anymore but hope he liked this card.

I used this image from a Mary Engelbreit daily calendar.

Image from Mary Englebreit daily calendar
Spellbinders -- Lg. classic inverted scalloped squares die
Stamps of Life -- Stand up 4 sentiments stamp
Decorative scissor for half circle

We had a full day yesterday at the St. Louis Art Museum, it was just too cold for outdoor activities for me, and since my hubby has to work on Valentines day that is what we did for our day out to celebrate.  While I was using the rest rooms he went into the shop there and bought me a pair of very pretty earrings, he is such a sweetie :) I will share the card I made him on Sunday.

Hope you have a great weekend and get a little time to create!

Connie

Shutter Valentine card

Since my daughter is very busy with work, college and her hubby, I figured I could share the card I made her for Valentine's day, you will have to wait until after to see what I did for my hubby, he checks my blog every now and then and I want it to be a surprise :)

This was another challenge in my stamp group, we had to do a shutter card, it didn't need to have the band but I like how it helps keep it closed and more fun to remove it wondering what is inside, and there had to be stamping on the front and inside.

HERE is the link to the video showing how to make this card.  This is the outside with the band on it, you want the band to be a bit lose or it is hard to get it on and off.

I had to add a little premade flower to the center of the heart and punched a border  on the band.

Here it is opened:

It was fun to make and my daughter likes the ones I send that do a little something extra.  I had to trim the ends of the inside a little more so that it opened and closed a bit smoother and I think she says that in the video or it is written and I didn't see that until I was having problems with it working smoothly and reread or watched the video a few more times.

BasicGrey -- Sugar Rush paper
Hero Arts -- All Occasions messages (for inside of card)
Stampin up -- Say it Simply stamp set on band
Martha Stewart -- border punch
Spellbinders -- classic sq. lg. die
Wilton -- fabric flower

Here are a couple pictures from our trip to find an Eagle that I was telling you about last week.

The first my hubby wrote on the picture how far away the Eagle was when we spotted it across the river. I took this picture with my point and shoot so we would remember how far away it was, the next two of the pictures are taken with his nice camera with a big lens that could capture it across the river.

Those were all taken from the Missouri side of the river, the eagle was on the Illinois side, so we drove around back to the Illinois side and walked down this nature preserve about a mile to where we saw the eagle and he flew away as soon as my hubby came up, he was so bummed, we started walking back to the car and I said now watch he will land on our car and tease us and fly away again and maybe 5 minutes later he landed on a tree right in front of us and my hubby was able to get these shots of him.

My hubby was bummed about all the branches being in the way but still happy to have seen an eagle in the wild that close up.

Hope your week is going well so far, thanks so much for stopping by,

Connie

Outside my window

In years past I have always had some kind of goal for the year in my card making, last year was to use those items that I had bought early on in my card making and I called the posts my Forgotten Treasures, I really need to carry that into this year I still have so many I want to use.

 At the beginning of this year I thought what should my challenge be for this year and I couldn't think of anything so I just went on, then I thought of all the ladies that come to my blog and give me such encouragement with your loving comments and I have decided to make each one of you lovely ladies a card throughout the year.

 I kind of started this last year with a few ladies.  But the first for this year went to Debbie from It's All about Purple .  She lives in New Jersey and we lived there for 5 years before being stationed (my hubby is now retired from the Air Force) down here in Mid/Southern Illinois.  So going to her blog and seeing some of the places we had went while living there brings back a lot of good memories.  She also takes the most beautiful pictures of the birds outside her window and that is what gave me the inspiration for this card.  She loves purple so that is where I started.  I used a piece of vellum on top of the pattern paper I used for wall paper inside her house, hubby said I should have use acetate it would have looked more like a window but the card was already put together when he made that suggestion, maybe next time :)

I wish now that I would have put something behind the card, all that white kind of washes out the tree. I added a bit of pen work and shading to the birds and squirrel and stickles to the flowers in the planter. Debbie also knits and shares projects that she is working on from time to time as well as all her adventures and Beautiful nature outside her door.

Here are the items I used in the card:

Sizzix -- Card base step up die

Fiskars -- Grass border punch

Impression Obsession -- Bare Tree, squirrel set and Oak leaves die sets

Poppystamps -- Country Fence, leafy sprig, small madison window set and Cheery Cardinals dies

Stickles -- Yellow on flowers

I am not setting myself a time frame to do these, when I think of a card that I feel would be good for a person I will email and ask for your address, if you don't want a card or don't want to give me your address I will understand completely.  I just wanted to give back a little something for you ladies that have been such an encouragement to me over the years, it means so much that you take out the time from your busy schedules to let me know what you think and just share life.

I am sharing today's post over at Stephanie's Roses of Inspiration. 

As always thanks so much for taking the time to stop by today, and have a lovely day,

Connie

Fetching you a Happy Birthday

Our niece on my hubby's side of the family and her hubby adopted a puppy this year, the same breed as we have but their puppy is shades of brown, I know it doesn't quite look like this dog but I still thought it would work for him on his birthday this year.

I tried to add a little shadow under him, LOL, yep still need practice with that. Did a little shading around the edges to dirty it up a bit.

Newton's nook design -- fetching friendship, colored w/markers
Memory Box-- distressed baptisia collage die

They are telling us once again we have a chance of snow in our future, may only be half an inch but we are behind on what we normally get in the winter so I guess we can use it.

Is anyone else here a Downton Abbey fan?  I am getting so sad that it is getting close to the end of this show, I have so enjoyed it.  I was wondering there for a bit they were going to kill off Lord Grantham with that ulcer.  Wow was that ever a scene they did.

Hope your new week is off to a great start, thanks so much for taking the time to stop by once again, and thanks again for your prayers for little Evelyn, I have told her Mom all the prayers that are going up for her.

Connie

Bird House

Do you all remember little miss Evelyn that I asked if you could pray for her, well this card went to her Mommy.  I feel so bad that I haven't done an update on how she is doing.  I will add that after the card.

I used Mojo sketch 284 for this card

JustRite -- Bird Houses stamp set, colored w/markers
Spellbinders -- classic circles lg, big scalloped circles lg and A2 matting basics A dies
DCWV -- Garden Party paper
Doodlebug designs-- sentiment stamp
Offray -- ribbon
Martha Stewart -- gems

Now onto Miss Evelyn, she has had to go in for another surgery, for hernia this time that she had as a result of the last surgery, but she is doing very well now, she still has appointments often as they keep a close eye on her progress, but she is just the sweetest little girl and is crawling and I think soon to be walking.

Here is a picture of her getting into her treats while Mommy was doing the dishes.

This is at the hospital a month ago. What you can't see is they have a screen above the bed that they show videos to the kids, I think it is a good way to get their minds off of what is going on, technology today huh!!

We are so thankful of how far this little girl has come, and thanks again for your prayers and thoughts for this little one.

Thanks so much for stopping by today and have a wonderful and creative weekend,

Connie

ODBDSLC270

Our Daily Bread designs has gone to having monthly challenges now, gives you more time to get them done, this months challenge is a sketch.  You can find out all the details HERE on their blog .

I was in need of another sympathy card, a friend at church lost her older sister.

I like how this stamp set works perfectly with the Spellbinders die set and I added just a pop of color with the sentiment. Their new mini sentiments stamps work great with the image set.

Our Daily bread designs -- Butterfly Labels and mini tag sentiments stamp sets
Spellbinders -- Labels 18 and A2 matting basics A dies
Best Occasions -- Mixed Media paper pack
Candi Mini's-- icing sugar
Offray-- Ribbon

We had another day out yesterday, this time looking for the bald eagles that come to this area around this time of year, I guess because it is so much warmer they are harder to find, but my hubby and I spotted one across the river, I haven't checked yet to see if the pictures turned out but if they did I will share some soon.

Hope you all enjoy a fun and very creative weekend,

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by and letting me know you did, so good to hear from you,

Connie

Card Purse

I forgot to share the little bag I made to put all those cards I shared earlier that I gave to my Secret Sis for our reveal.  I used papers from the same pack so it all matched.  I used This Video Tutorial , to make the bag.

DCWV -- Garden party paper
Spellbinders -- classic Square die
Martha Stewart -- Border, flower and leaf punches
Inkadinkado -- All Occasions sentiment stamp
Forever in time -- buttons
Ribbon for handles

I used Scorpal tape to attach the ribbons, it is pretty heavy duty and I carried it around for a bit and it seemed to hold very well.

Thanks to everyone for the nice comments on my banner, so glad you liked it and even want to make one of your own :)

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by today,

Connie

Valentine Banner

Before our week of challenges one of the girls in the stamping group said she wanted to make a banner for valentines and she was challenging the rest of us to do one too, well I had been wanting to make one and sometimes you just need a challenge to get you to finally do it.  I had an idea of what I wanted to do already but one of the things to the challenge was to have stamping and I wasn't quite sure how I was going to add stamping to it, I showed my hubby what I had done so far and he said the background on the white banners were to bare I should stamp a light background on them, so I have to thank him for the great idea!

Here is a closeup of one of the letters, I used a distressed text background stamp on them.

I used scraps of fabric and ribbon in between the letters, you have to have lace on a valentine banner right :)  and I added a row of pearl stickers across the top of the lace too.  The letters are all dies.  I had glued them on before stamping so when I stamped over them it gave a bit of a halo around the letters.  I used my crop a dile to cut holes into the burlap paper so I could string the twine through.

DCWV -- Burlap backed paper
Spellbinders -- Baby buntings and Font one dies
Lace
Glitz designs -- distressed background stamp set
Recollections -- bling on a roll
Shading around the banner was done with vintage photo distress inks

I am sharing this today on Apple Apricot Simply Neutrals and with Stephanie's Roses of Inspiration link up parties.  Stop by these blogs and just soak up all the inspiration and beautiful creations and pictures!

Thanks so much for taking time out of your busy day to stop by,

Connie

Make an Impression Challenge

This challenge was to make an impression in your modeling paste by inking up a stamp and stamping it into a thin layer of paste.  This was my third attempt at this, I used Golden's Molding paste since I don't have any of those other pastes and the other tries I had way too much paste, and I think I was using the wrong kind of stamp too, my third attempt I went with this sentiment stamp and inked it with brown ink.  The brown ink mixed with the paste kind of gave it a look of green, so that is what determined the paper I picked out and then I just thought of the frog die my husband had bought for his artwork and I decided to use that.  I added those with foam adhesives because they blended in too much with the paper, I also inked around them.  This went to my great nephew who turned 9.

If you want to give this a try just remember if you don't like how it is turning out you probably have too much paste.  I tore the paper to frame it and added some black soot distress ink to dirty it up a bit.

Great Impressions -- all boy stamp
Golden -- Molding paste w/brown ink
DCWV -- Earth prints & cardstock paper
Poppystamps -- pond frogs dies

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop in today and hope you have a wonderful week to come,

Connie