Crazy About You, Deer: PP275

Hiya friends! We are winding things down at The Paper Players with our final challenge of 2015.  After this week, we will take a little Paper Players break to enjoy the holidays.  We will be back on January 3rd with a new challenge and a new set of Guest Designers!  Unfortunately, that means we say goodbye to our current crew of Guest Designers: Amy, Jodi & Lisa.  We are sad to see them go but it has been wonderful working with all of them--thanks ladies!

Lovely LeAnne is our hostess this week with a beautiful trio of traditional colors...

Our daughter celebrated her birthday yesterday and I used this week's challenge as the inspiration for her card:

I had so much fun making this card!  I knew our daughter would love the sweet little deer in the Home for Christmas DSP and the other patterns in the pack fit the color challenge.  I decided to use two deer to represent my husband and myself. Even though the deer actually had a Real Red bow, I used the lightest shade of a Cherry Cobbler Blendabilities marker (remember those?) to change the color to match our challenge.  

 Because this is her golden birthday--she turned 12 on December 12th--I added lots of gold accents with the gold thread and gold vellum paper.  You can't see it in the photo but the deer also have a brush of golden Wink of Stella on their backs.

Maybe you can see that I also brushed it onto the die-cut thinlit that coordinates with the Crazy For You stamp set.  You might also notice that the die-cut is pretty thick.  That's four layers of die-cut glued together.  To make it easy, I added a piece of adhesive sheet paper to the back of my Cherry Cobbler cardstock before I ran it through the Big Shot.  Peel the backing off and just stacked each one to build up a nice substantial weight.  I think it really stands out more than the single layer.

One more fussy-cut deer that I thought might be just like our daughter jumping for joy on her birthday.  She was having so much fun that she kicked up some golden stardust too!  

I hope you'll kick up some action in your craft space this week and join us for one last 2015 challenge at The Paper Players.  The rest of the Design Team have some beautiful inspiration for you so be sure to check it out before the challenge closes on Friday, December 18th at Noon (PST).  I'll be taking a bit of a bloggy break until the new year so here's wishing you a Happy Holiday and a peaceful New Year!

 

The Paper Players Design Team

Claire Broadwater 

Jaydee 

Joanne James 

Laurie Schmidt

 LeAnne Pugliese

 Nance Leedy

Sandy Mathis

Amy Koenders

Jodi McKinney 

Lisa Elton

A Snowy Sleigh Ride: PP274

Oh my gosh, friends!  I've been away from my blog for weeks--I'm so sorry.  Holiday travel, volleyball, birthdays and special events have kept me crazy, crazy busy!  I know you're all feeling it too so I will keep this short.  My dear friend, Claire, has a fun and festive challenge at The Paper Players for us:

With precious little time to work on a DT card, I grabbed my Sleigh Ride edgelit dies for a quick card:

This card features some of my very favorite products from this holiday catalog.  Besides the wonderful edgelit dies, the Softly Falling embossing folder and the wooden Snowflake Elements are beautiful!  

To make the sentiment panel, I cut a large piece of Very Vanilla cardstock with the Sleigh Ride edgelit and then trimmed it down to 4" wide to fit the front panel of my card.  The sentiment from To You and Yours was stamped in Mossy Meadow to coordinate with my die cut tree horizon.  In keeping with the theme, I used a snow flurry pattern from the Home for Christmas DSP and stamped some additional snowflakes in Pool Party.

A couple Pool Party brushstrokes from A Work of Art created a swirling background of snow for the inside and this retired sentiment remains a favorite.  

I hope you've enjoyed today's card!  Be sure to pop over to The Paper Players and check out the inspiration from the rest of the Design Team.  We hope you will find some time in your schedule to get crafty with us this week!  Our challenge closes on Friday, December 11th at Noon (PST).  Thanks for hanging in there with me!

 The Paper Players Design Team

Claire Broadwater 

Jaydee 

Joanne James 

Laurie Schmidt

 LeAnne Pugliese

 Nance Leedy

Sandy Mathis

Amy Koenders

Jodi McKinney 

Lisa Elton

To You & Yours in a Winter Wonderland PP271

OK, y'all...thank goodness this week's challenge at The Paper Players is a Clean-and-Simple one because I don't have much energy for anything else!  Jaydee is our fabulous hostess with the mostest and she's bringing on the festive challenges:

The most difficult part about creating my card for this challenge was deciding just which Winter Wonderland stamp I was going to use.  In the end, I settled on one that I haven't seen too much of in blogland but I just love....

The stamp set is called To You & Yours and it coordinates with the To You & Yours Shaker Cards kit from the Holiday Catalog.  I truly bought it just for this silhouette image.  Love the trees and the deer!

The image is stamped in Blackberry Bliss onto think Whisper White cardstock.  The only thing tricky about this card is the fact that I only partially embossed the white panel.  I didn't want my stamped image to be embossed so I ran the panel only partially through the Big Shot with the Softly Falling embossing folder.  When I got to about the midway point, I back tracked on the Big Shot so I ended up with only the embossed sky here.  The rest is pretty obvious....keeping it REALLY clean and simple here.  I do like the elegant combination of White, Silver, Blackberry Bliss and Smoky Slate.  

Check out the rest of the Design Team creations over at The Paper Players.  We hope you will join us for Clean-and Simple week before our challenge closes on Friday, November 20th at Noon (PST)!  We would love to see you in the gallery....thanks for stopping by!

The Paper Players Design Team

Claire Broadwater 

Jaydee 

Joanne James 

Laurie Schmidt

 LeAnne Pugliese

 Nance Leedy

Sandy Mathis

Amy Koenders

Jodi McKinney

Lisa Elton

Anne Marie Hile (on leave) 

Holly Jolly Greetings for The Paper Players PP270

Today, my sweet friend across the pond, Joanne, has a lovely and festive color challenge for us at The Paper Players:

Isn't that fun?  Black & white plus silver or gold and a pop of color.  This color combination reads like a festive holiday outfit so I've finally moved on to holiday cards!

You can see I chose to create with black, white, silver and my favorite frosty color--Pool Party.  I struggle with this style of collage stamping but I had a vision for this card and am happy with the results.  I used the large cross hatch design from You've Got This for a pop of color. 

The snowflake and sentiments are from the Holly Jolly Greetings set with coordinating Greetings Thinlits.  I heat embossed the snowflake in white onto Silver Foil paper and popped it out with a Circle Framelit.

The greeting looks lovely and fancy cut from Black Glimmer paper doesn't it?  Who said black glimmer paper is just for Halloween?!   Certainly, not me!

Another snowflake was stamped on the inside, this time in Pool Party and the sentiment, overstamped in black, is from the [retired] set Ornamental Pine.  Incidentally, the sentiment is stamped in SU's new Archival black ink and WOW what a difference it makes!  It gives a clean and strong image and is hands-down the best black ink I've worked with.  

I just know the rest of the Design Team have some fabulous creations for you--make sure to take a look over at The Paper Players.  I hope you will be inspired to join in our challenge fun before it ends on Friday, November 13th at Noon (PST).  Thanks for stopping by today, friends!

The Paper Players Design Team 
Claire Broadwater 

Jaydee 
Joanne James 
Laurie Schmidt 
LeAnne Pugliese 
Nance Leedy 
Sandy Mathis 
Amy Koenders 
Jodi McKinney 
Lisa Elton 
Anne Marie Hile (on leave) 

A Woodlands Thank You PP269

Hiya friends!  Can you believe it's November already?  This week at The Paper Players, Claire has a timely theme challenge for this month of thanksgiving (at least in the United States)....

I am still not tired of the Woodlands embossing folder and coordinating stamp set, Among the Branches, so I hope you aren't either.  I just love the way it looks when inked up before running through the Big Shot:

There are two ways to apply ink to an embossing folder.  You can either apply the ink to the smooth side of the folder which results in a colored space in between the trees.  Or, you can apply ink to the raised part of the folder, in this case the trees, which results in the trees themselves being colored as you see here.  Two different looks--this one seems to highlight the trees a bit more.

You can probably see what I mean better in this pic where the debossed trees are colored with the Crumb Cake ink I used to ink the folder.  The leaves were stamped in Rich Razzleberry, Cajun Craze and Crushed Curry--so a lovely fall color combination.  

A few more leaves fluttered to the inside of the card where I used a sentiment from a returning 2014 Holiday Catalog set, Merry Everything.  Such a great set with a sentiment for every fall/winter holiday!

Today's card was pretty simple to create but I hope you like the details in the design.  I know you're going to love the creations from the rest of the design team so be sure to hop over to The Paper Players before our challenge closes on Friday, November 6th at Noon (PST).

The Paper Players Design Team

Claire Broadwater
 Jaydee

Joanne James 

Laurie Schmidt

LeAnne Pugliese 

Nance Leedy 

Sandy Mathis

Amy Koenders

Jodi McKinney

Lisa Elton 

Anne Marie Hile (on leave)

Joseph's Coat of Autumn Leaves: PP268

Hi friends!  The lovely LeAnne has a wonderful sketch challenge for us this week at The Paper Players.  Check it out:

Isn't it a great one?  I love the three panels and anything with a circle makes me happy!  I'm not quite ready to dive into Christmas cards yet.....still enjoying fall themes and colors.  I played around with the Joseph's Coat technique (here's a tutorial) and ended up with this:

And by "played around", I mean it took me three tries to get it right!  You really do need to let the sponged on ink dry a good, long while so the embossing powder doesn't stick to the ink.  Just zapping it with my heat gun wasn't enough.  I had to let it sit overnight!  For the sponged background, I used Cajun Craze, Hello Honey and Rich Razzleberry.  Early Espresso was inked over top of the embossing.  Believe it or not, the strip of DSP that looks purple is actually Rich Razzleberry.  The light at the end of the day is deceiving!

This gorgeous leaf is from a 2014 holiday stamp set called "For All Things."  The large solid leaf image works great for this technique and the little bit of texture it has allows the Early Espresso to sink it and provide even more subtle shading.

I added a burlap circle behind the sentiment for a little texture and contrast.  I used a Circle Framelit to cut out two semi-circles from the wide burlap ribbon and taped them together behind the sentiment.  The sentiment circle hid the tape and gives the illusion of one full circle.  A little gold cord thread, some sequins and this one's done!

I hope you try your hand at LeAnne's fabulous sketch.  Be sure to check out the rest of the design team work for inspiration and then join us, at The Paper Players, before the challenge closes on Friday, October 30th at Noon (PST).  Thanks for stopping by today!

The Paper Players Design Team

Claire Broadwater
 Jaydee

Joanne James 

Laurie Schmidt

LeAnne Pugliese 

Nance Leedy 

Sandy Mathis

Amy Koenders

Jodi McKinney

Lisa Elton 

Anne Marie Hile (on leave)

Masked & Vintage Leaves: PP267

Hi all!  I am so excited to host our challenge over at The Paper Players this week.  It's Clean-and-Simple week and I've added one of my favorite things to it...Leaves!

I fussed around with a few ideas for this challenge but, in the end, settled on an all-time favorite technique of masking for my card:

You might recall that I featured this technique on this card a few weeks ago.  It's so much fun to do and with lots of white space and no frills, it definitely fits the Clean-and Simple bill.  My good friend Linda Callahan recently introduced me to Post-It Tape.  That's right, tape!  It comes on a roll and can be ripped off in whatever length you need.  It's the perfect tool for this project as you just lay it across your cardstock to create your masked area and then sponge, sponge, sponge!  I masked off the strip of the Very Vanilla base and sponged on (starting at the bottom) Tangerine Tango, Delightful Dijon and Lost Lagoon inks.  Once the colors were to my liking, I stamped some images from the Vintage Leaves set and finished it with a sentiment from One Big Meaning. 

I love how the Lost Lagoon and Delightful Dijon blended together to create a subtle shade of green where they meet.  And, aren't these leaves just the best?  I can't get over how detailed they are--especially for a photopolymer stamp set!  Just fabulous, right?!

And I happen to know that the rest of the Design Team have even more fabulous inspiration for you over at The Paper Players.  Be sure to check them out and consider playing along with us before the challenge closes on Friday, October 23rd at Noon (PST).  I would love to see you in the gallery!  Thanks for stopping by.

The Paper Players Design Team

Claire Broadwater
 Jaydee  Joanne James
Laurie Schmidt  LeAnne Pugliese 

Nance Leedy  Sandy Mathis  Amy Koenders  Jodi McKinney  Lisa Elton

Anne Marie Hile (on leave)

Berry Merry for the Paper Players: PP266

Hi all!  It's the fabulous Jaydee's turn to host over at The Paper Players and she has a bright color challenge for us:

 

When I first saw these colors, I must admit, I was stumped!  But then I saw the wisdom in the choices and realized they would make a fabulous holiday card!  Thanks, Jaydee!

Using the Berry Merry bundle and some thick Whisper White cardstock, this card came together quickly.  All these little images are part of the set and were just perfect for the challenge colors.  Because the colors are so bright, I wanted to use a lot of white space and keep the rest of the card simple.  Although it doesn't show up well in this photo, the sentiment is heat embossed in gold.  Gold embossing adds such an easy elegant touch--especially on holiday cards.  That's a little touch of some [retired] Real Red satin ribbon and 1/8" Gold Ribbon to dress it up just a bit.

I dressed up the inside too.  I just love this little stardust image from this set, here in Crushed Curry, it has such a retro vibe to it that I could see it on some Christmas wrapping paper from my 70s childhood.

Thanks for stopping by today....before you go, check out the rest of the work from our DT over at The Paper Players!  We hope you will play along with us before our challenge ends on Friday, October 16th at Noon (PST).

The Paper Players Design Team

Claire Broadwater
 Jaydee 
Joanne James
Laurie Schmidt 
LeAnne Pugliese 

Nance Leedy 
Sandy Mathis 
Amy Koenders 
Jodi McKinney 
Lisa Elton

Anne Marie Hile (on leave)

 

Product list:

Table built using Product Table Builder by The Crafty Owl - Independent Stampin' Up! Demonstrator.

Halloween Among the Branches {PP265}

I am so excited with Joanne's Theme Challenge this week at The Paper Players:

I love Halloween and I couldn't wait to make some spooky trees with the Among the Branches stamp set:

As much as I love Halloween, I love TREES even more!  Combine trees with Halloween and I'm in carad making heave.  Naturally, this embossing folder was a must-have item for me.  I couldn't wait to brayer some color on the folder and run it through the Big Shot for this colored background look.  Love the way the inked background makes the trees pop.  The brayered ink also makes for an imperfect look which is just right to create my spooky, foggy night.  

I'm going to have to cut this short as I am writing this early and still need to pack for a weekend trip.  Please check out the rest of The Paper Players Design Team and their fabulous creations.  We hope that you will play along with us before the challenge closes on Friday, October 9th at Noon (PDT).  Thanks for stopping by!
 

The Paper Players Design Team

  Claire Broadwater
 Jaydee

Joanne James
Laurie Schmidt

 LeAnne Pugliese 

Nance Leedy

Sandy Mathis

Amy Koenders
Jodi McKinney

Lisa Elton

Anne Marie Hile (on leave)

A Wonderland of Layers {PP264}

Hiya friends and welcome to another week with The Paper Players where lovely Claire has a fantastic sketch for us:

Sketch challenges are my favorite because, for me, the layout of all my elements is the most difficult part.  With a sketch challenge, it's already done for me!  Claire loves layers...and glitz...and glam!  So I had to make sure that my card for her sketch lived up to ALL of those elements.  I think I managed a few...

I think this is one layered and glitzy card, don't you?!  I used the beautiful Winter Wonderland Specialty DSP for all my layers and the elegant color combination of black, gold and white.   This paper is so gorgeous--with a rich, glossy finish and elegant patterns--every sheet is a winner! 

On top of the Basic Black base is a layer of Gold Foil paper embossed with the Softly Falling embossing folder--another beauty.  So pretty in metallic.

I heat embossed these gorgeous trees from the Wonderland stamp set onto some gold striped DSP.  The sentiment was also heat embossed onto cardstock Vellum and wrapped around the main panel and adhered to the back.

And how pretty are these wooden Snowflake Elements?  Especially when paired with Iced Rhinestones and Gold Metallic Thread.   

I really like how this one turned out and it all started with Claire's fantastic sketch!  I hope that you will play along with the sketch before our challenge ends on Friday, October 2nd at Noon (PDT).  Before you go, be sure to check out the rest of the Design Team with their fabulous creations....thanks for stopping by!

The Paper Players Design Team

  Claire Broadwater
 Jaydee

Joanne James
Laurie Schmidt

 LeAnne Pugliese 

Nance Leedy

Sandy Mathis

Amy Koenders
Jodi McKinney

Lisa Elton

Anne Marie Hile (on leave)